Thinking Proactively on Police Innovation

Law Enforcement Innovation Predictive Policing Smart PolicingLeave a comment

Getting police to think more about using data in decision-making has become extremely important today, perhaps more than ever.

As a visiting fellow at the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), police innovation is an area I am focusing on, particularly predictive policing and smart policing, both of which involve analytics.

The era of proactive, problem-solving policing is here. Technology-based tools are in use in more and more communities across our nation to “pre-empt” crime by helping law enforcement predict, prevent, and reduce cross-jurisdictional violence. Modern crime fighting also helped police go from reacting to crimes to calculating where it is likely to happen and deploying personnel and resources there accordingly.

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What is the Value of Crime Analysts?

Crime Analysis Law Enforcement InnovationLeave a comment

About a year ago, my team at Justice & Security Strategies started getting questions from police departments.

Administrators at smaller departments were asking: “What is the value of crime analysis and how do we defend the requests we want to make for these civilian positions?” 

Before long, administrators from medium and large departments, facing budget cuts, were inquiring about similar dilemmas: “How do we keep crime analysts, justify them, make sure people understand what they do—and how do we work with the city budget people who don’t understand crime analysis and its value?”

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