Relative Danger
Pareto in Prison
Mark Morgan et al.
Behavioral Sciences & the Law, forthcoming
Abstract:
The Pareto principle is based on the concept that roughly 80% of outcomes are generated by 20% of inputs, efforts, or contributors within a group. Using a national sample of U.S. prison inmates, we examined various percentile rankings of self-reported institutional misconduct to determine how much disorder is created behind bars by the most prolific offenders. Findings revealed that, regardless of sex, the top 20% of inmates were responsible for approximately 90% of all rule violations and write-ups received. These general patterns remained similar even after adjusting infractions for time served in prison. Further analyses indicated that membership within these high-rate groups was often significantly predicted by those who were younger, black, had more extensive criminal histories, committed violent crimes, resided in state facilities, anticipated being released, used drugs prior to their arrest, were diagnosed with a personality disorder or ADHD, and exhibited worse negative affect. Some sex-specific effects were also observed. The disproportionate impact these chronic offenders have on the prison environment is detrimental to all individuals who live and work around them. Future research should investigate specific types of misconduct, distinct time intervals of incarceration, and facility effects such as management style, security levels, or offender composition.
Are Personality Traits Predictors of Police Misconduct?
Sierra Lynch
Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, December 2024, Pages 764-780
Abstract:
Several forms of police misconduct exist, including the inappropriate use of a weapon, sexual misconduct, and racially offensive behaviors, and deserve more attention in the literature. More recent literature suggests that there may be personality predictors of misconduct. Specifically, aggression, having unstable relationships, a lack of empathy, thrill-seeking behavior, and poor impulse control, may contribute to officer misconduct. The current study examined a group of 642 first-year police officers through a series of mostly logistic regression analyses to determine if antisocial or borderline personality traits predict inappropriate use of a weapon, sexual misconduct, and racially offensive behavior using scales from the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, Second Edition (MMPI-2; the antisocial practices and the psychopathic deviance scales) and the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI; the borderline and antisocial scales). Most of the hypotheses were not supported by the findings. Participants who had more antisocial traits, as assessed by MMPI-2, were less likely to be accused of racially offensive behavior. Officers who had more borderline characteristics, as assessed by the MMPI-2, were less likely to be accused of engagement in any misconduct, specifically sexual misconduct. However, participants who had more borderline traits, as assessed by the PAI, were more likely to engage in sexual misconduct, but less likely to engage in any misconduct overall. Demographic covariates also were found to be related to all three forms of misconduct.
From the Block to the Beat: How Violence in Officers’ Neighborhoods Influences Racially Biased Policing
Samuel Thomas Donahue & Gerard Torrats-Espinosa
American Journal of Sociology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research on the relationship between police discrimination and place has focused on a single context: the workplace. However, theories of group dynamics, exclusion, and place tend to emphasize the unique importance of one’s residential context. This article attends to this oversight by examining the impact of homicides near officers’ homes on their behavior at work. We link officer- and event-level administrative data from the Chicago Police Department (CPD) to the Illinois Voter File to construct a novel data structure that allows us to observe the demographic characteristics of officers, their workplace activity, and the characteristics of the neighborhoods where they reside. Using a quasi-experimental design, we find causal evidence that when a homicide occurs in close proximity to a White officer’s home, it causes a significant increase in the likelihood that the officer uses force during encounters with Black pedestrians for the subsequent week.
Do high value target strikes reduce cartel-related violence? An empirical assessment of crime trends in Tijuana, Mexico
Juan Del Rio
Trends in Organized Crime, December 2024, Pages 429–452
Abstract:
High-value target strikes -- the practice of apprehending or lethally targeting high-ranking members of transnational criminal organizations -- has become a frequently used tactic of U.S. and Mexican authorities to combat drug trafficking organizations. The study focuses on the unintentional outcomes of this policy by using an interrupted times-series AutoRegressive Integrative Moving Average (ARIMA) study design combined with a paired sample t-test, to analyze the effect that the arrest of Arellano Felix Organization leader, Luis Fernando Sánchez Arellano, and subsequent arrest of Sinaloa Cartel leader, Joaquín Guzmán (El Chapo), had on levels of homicide in Tijuana, Mexico from 2012 to 2017. Findings revealed that the capture of both cartel leaders led to a statistically significant increase in the number of homicides in Tijuana, as the apprehension of these leaders allowed for the arrival of rival organizations in the Tijuana trafficking corridor. The appearance of competing groups in Tijuana prompted turf battles between organizations to develop.
Gun Policy and the Steel Paradox: Evidence from Oregunians
Katie Bollman et al.
NBER Working Paper, January 2025
Abstract:
Using Measure 114’s narrow passage in Oregon as a natural experiment, we study how new gun regulations affect firearm demand. Background checks, a proxy for demand, rose 13.9% in anticipation of the referendum and surged 157% immediately following the election. After judicial intervention halted the law’s enactment, demand returned near pre-election levels. Temporal displacement/harvesting does not explain the demand spike: after eighteen months, we still observe a substantial cumulative increase of 63,000 excess firearm-related background checks. Administrative data reveal significant county-level heterogeneity. This evidence underscores the paradoxical effect of gun-control policies, offering a cautionary lesson to policymakers.
Do austerity cuts spare police budgets? Welfare-to-carceral realignment during fiscal crises
Brenden Beck
Criminology, November 2024, Pages 623-654
Abstract:
Did governments shift funding from their social welfare functions to their criminal justice functions after the 1980s? Studies investigating this possible “punitive turn” have been inconclusive and have been conducted at the state or national scale. Cities, however, are increasingly important as government responsibility devolves downward and social movements target municipal police budgets. This study contributes to ongoing academic and political debates about welfare-state retrenchment and police department funding using data on 390 U.S. cities between 1990 and 2019. In contrast to conventional explanations for budgetary restructuring that foreground across-the-board cuts or macroeconomic causes, this study proposes a fiscal crisis model that emphasizes localized budget deficits, beliefs about policing's primacy, and police agencies’ political power. Data reveal gradual and considerable municipal budgetary restructuring toward law enforcement between 1990 and 2019, with police funding growing 32% relative to social spending. Fixed-effects regression models with asymmetric predictors find that when municipal revenues fell by 10%, cities reduced police expenditures by an associated 1% and social service expenditures by 4%, with parks and housing seeing the biggest cuts. During austerity, municipalities cut police shallowly and temporarily while cutting social services deeply and enduringly, accelerating welfare-to-carceral realignment.
The Hidden Health Care Crisis Behind Bars: A Randomized Trial to Accredit U.S. Jails
Marcella Alsan & Crystal Yang
NBER Working Paper, January 2025
Abstract:
The U.S. has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, with over seven million individuals admitted to jails each year. These incarcerated individuals are the only group in the U.S. that have a constitutional right to receiving "reasonably adequate" health care. Yet, there is little oversight and funding for health care in jails, where illness and mortality are rampant. In this study, we randomize the offer of health care accreditation to 44 jails across the U.S. Surveys of staff indicate that accreditation improves coordination between health and custody staff. We also find that accreditation improves quality standards and reduces mortality among the incarcerated, which is three times higher among control facilities than official estimates suggest. These health gains are realized alongside suggestive reductions in six-month recidivism, such that accreditation is highly cost effective.
The ecology of business environments and consequences for crime
John Hipp & Cheyenne Hodgen
Criminology, November 2024, Pages 859-891
Abstract:
Research has typically focused on how certain types of business establishments are associated with the location of crime on street blocks. Studies in this genre, however, often have not accounted for the general business context of the block on which a business is located. This study uses a large sample of blocks in Southern California to test whether the context of businesses matters. We assess whether a nonlinear relationship exists between the total businesses on a block and crime, whether differences exist based on broad categories of businesses -- consumer-facing businesses, blue-collar businesses, and white-collar businesses -- and whether the mixing of businesses on a block impacts crime. The study finds strong evidence that blocks with more business mixing have higher levels of crime. A 1 standard deviation increase in business mixing is associated with 35%–95% more crime. The relationship between business mixing and crime is moderated by the size of the population on the block. Evidence also shows differences in relationships with crime between consumer-facing and white- or blue-collar businesses. Only modest evidence shows that specific business types are related to crime levels after accounting for this general business context.
Military Exposure and Crime in the Very Long Run: Evidence from the Vietnam Lotteries
Nicholas Lovett & Yuhan Xue
University of Wisconsin Working Paper, November 2024
Abstract:
We investigate the long-term impact of military exposure on criminal offending by exploiting random variation induced by the Vietnam Draft Lottery. Using administrative records of California arrests spanning the 1970s through the 2000s, we employ both reduced-form and Two-Sample Instrumental Variable approaches and find that military exposure significantly and substantially increases violent offending. Strikingly, effects are remarkably persistent, with violent crime elevated even three decades after the war. Examination of potential pathways provides no evidence that offending is driven by income-generation motives or prior experience with firearms, but offers suggestive evidence that exposure to trauma may be a key driver.
Slavery’s Carceral Legacy in the Jim Crow South
John Clegg
American Journal of Sociology, forthcoming
Abstract:
A burgeoning social scientific literature on the place-based legacy of slavery has mostly overlooked the effect of slavery on incarceration, despite the fact that the intensity and racial disparity of US incarceration is often attributed to its history of slavery. I analyze data on incarceration from 1840 to 2020 and show that the historic prevalence of slavery tends to be negatively associated with Black incarceration, especially under Reconstruction and Jim Crow (1870-1940). In line with recent work by Christopher Muller, I argue this is at least partly explained by white planters paying the fines of Black convicts, who would then have to work off the debt or suffer imprisonment. I conclude that the existing literature is not wrong to assume that Southern incarceration was shaped by slavery. But it shaped it in surprising ways that previous work has often failed to identify.