The Employment of Predictive Policing in Law Enforcement
The employment of mathematical, prognostic, and analytical tools in law enforcement to identify likely criminal conduct is referred to as predictive policing (Chan & Moses, 2016). Predictive policing may be beneficial in anticipating potential crimes, lawbreakers, the names of criminals, and crime victims. Predictive policing relies heavily on the police department's interaction with the community in order to combat crime.
Analyzing Data for Crime Reduction
Predictive policing analyzes data on the time, location, and circumstances of previous criminal acts to instruct police planners on when and where resourceful police services should be available to improve crime reduction. Traditional policing tactics, such as community policing, problem-oriented policing, intelligence-led policing, and hotspot policing, are used in predictive policing. Predictive policing controls computer models that are used to anticipate crime for law enforcement purposes.
Implications of Predictive Policing
Existing analytical methods and tools, such as data mining, hotspots, crime mapping, and social network analysis among others are applicable in a wide field of criminal justice (Chan & Moses, 2016). For example, some of the methods can be used to expect local crime spikes and help in major law enforcement agency management decisions. These speculations on crime, therefore, enable the police force to be at a potential spot at the right time.
Predictive policing has a number of implications for law enforcement organizations. Predictive policing enables fast response to crime situations. Reaction to predicted criminal activities is fast and possibly leads to crime solving. Its implementation leads to a more effective and efficient law enforcement organization.
Preparing for Criminal Activities
The anticipation of criminal activities also prepares police officers for encounters with offenders. This is an advantage to the law enforcement agency in that preparation for potential crime enables excellent performance and delivery of services.Similarly, quick response to crime situations is an added advantage to the public since it enhances the safety of the community involved. Potential criminal activities may also be discouraged by the availability of patrol officers in crime hotspots (Joel Rubin, 2010).
Roles of Law Enforcement Managers
There are a number of roles tasked to the law enforcement managers. Roles of these officers vary according to the different branches in which the law enforcers are assigned. In the federal branch, the obligations of the officers are centered on the enforcement of federal laws and the investigation of federal crimes. They are engaged in the investigation, prosecution, elimination of potential terror threats, robberies, illegal acts such as frauds and gambling.
Law enforcement managers in the local branches consist of different duties ranging from patrol officers, investigative, supervisory duties to the sheriff's department. Local officers mostly work within the community in ensuring orderliness and peace within its environs. The patrol officers are usually found within the community on foot, on horseback or even by car among others. They mostly respond to emergencies within the community such as crime scenes, accidents and other criminal incidents.
Among the roles of a law enforcement manager in the detectives’ branch are undertaking investigations and looking for solutions in the crime scenes. They are also located in the community but are mostly found in the field. They lead investigations into crime scenes, put together evidence, gather information through interviewing possible offenders and victims and also consult with various law enforcement agencies.
Supervisory law enforcement managers are tasked with management of operations in different agencies and departments. They monitor the law enforcement workforce. They also observe the performance of other officers, conduct hiring of new officers, direct investigations, assign cases and safeguard healthy community policing.
Similarly, the responsibilities of a law enforcement manager consist of a range of technical assignments, for example, forensics, cybercrime and its investigations and ballistics inquiries. Generally, law enforcement officers render immense services to the members of the community ranging from investigating and solving criminal cases to preventing the occurrence of similar incidents of crime.
Advantages of Predictive Policing
Predictive policing has a number of advantages. Predictive policing enables the police department to function more proactively with restricted resources. This occurs through the development of efficient and effective strategies that will curb crime or ease the investigation of crime through applying predictive policing. Another advantage is that it creates a reference guide used by departments concerned with predictive policing by availing valuations of both the promising technical tools for creating predictions and the most efficient method of taking action on them most importantly, the guide created contextualizes predictive policing into other current proactive policing strategies (Walter, 2013).
Predictive policing shows law enforcement agencies when and where to look that significantly helps officers (Khan et al., 2015). This happens through the availability of a better understanding of criminal behaviors and the likelihood of which way they might commit crimes. It pinpoints characteristics that foretell the probability of committing future crimes and if true, may lead to the prevention of occurrence of the said criminal activities.
Predictive policing is also instrumental in developing good relations between the police and the community around it. The prevention of potential crime or the availability of the police in crime hot spot areas is a major service that the community appreciates (Khan et al., 2015). In turn, the community is free to give vital resources to police officers and this continued reliance on each other creates a steady and healthy relationship. Predictive policing also leads to a safer community. Patrolling officers in crime hotspot also discourages would-be offenders which are an added advantage.
Drawbacks of Predictive Policing
Even though predictive analysis is a major advancement in criminal justice, it still has a number of drawbacks. Predictive policing is affected by a high rate of racial profiling. Its methodology is majorly reliant on statistical probabilities rather than individual misgivings of committing a crime. In minority communities, predictive policing may lead to biased information results that may be criticized as racial that negates the constitution (Walter, 2013).
Predictive policing also leads to overdependence on technology (Joh, 2016). Computerised results may be misleading due to a number of factors; data inputs may be biased or incorrect leading to wrong inferences, or, the information presented may be wrongly interpreted leading to inaccurate results. Similarly, information that may be presented can be casually correlated but the computerized program is unable to connect the dots and give satisfactory results.
Conclusion
In conclusion, predictive policing can be described as a game changer in fighting crime. It is fundamental in situational awareness for areas with a high likelihood of committing crime, where fruitful interventions have led to a great boost in the safety of the community around. It has significantly helped in easing the investigative role of the law enforcement agency by discouraging prospective crime. Despite the few shortcomings, predictive policing can be termed as a wonderful invention.
References
Chan, J., & Bennett Moses, L. (2016). Is Big Data Challenging Criminology?. Theoretical criminology, 20(1), 21-39.
Joh, E. E. (2016). The new surveillance discretion: Automated suspicion, big data, and policing. Harv. L. & Pol'y Rev., 10, 15.
Khan, Z., Anjum, A., Soomro, K., & Tahir, M. A. (2015). Towards cloud based big data analytics for smart future cities. Journal of Cloud Computing, 4(1), 2.
Walter L. Perry (2013). Predictive Policing: The Role of Crime Forecasting in Law Enforcement Operations. RAND Corporation.
