Hot spot profiles
Once hotspots have been identified, the next steps involve beginning to develop
an understanding of the nature of the crime or disorder problems in these areas.
This process will also help begin to prioritise areas that require attention, and
assist the partnership in making more informed decisions about the type of crime and
disorder reduction resources to apply.
A profile of crime and disorder within the hotspot provides a useful way forward.
Types of analysis to perform at this stage include,
analysis of crime and disorder events within the focus area. This will include
analysing particular types of crime to reveal the main problems within the focus area.
At this stage the partnership will begin to draw on other guidance and expertise
for reducing crime and disorder and that will help develop understanding of the problems
within the focus areas. For example, this may include drawing from the other toolkits
that provide guidance for tackling specific crime types.
victim profiles – gathering information on victims, as described in the toolkits
for individual crime categories.
offender profiles - gathering information on offenders, as described in the
toolkits for individual crime categories.
Street crime and robbery
Domestic burglary
Vehicle crime
Domestic violence
Drug related crime
Racial crime and harassment
Business and retail crime
At this stage an analysis of hotspots will have helped the partnership to identify
areas that require focus. Further enquiry and intelligence gathering can help to
better inform the decision-making process. This type of intelligence gathering can
include
empirical analysis of current trends and activity (gathered by patrol officers)
analysis of modus operandi
analysis of network links between offenders, other offenders and their victims
exchange of personal information and intelligence on specific individuals (within
the guidelines of the local information sharing protocol)
intelligence information of local illicit markets
the linking of criminality – this will include investigating crime and disorder
events in a less isolated manner and helping to explore the reasons why incidents
occur (e.g. a drug abuser robs to get money to fund their habit). Linking information
helps to understand what can drive crime in certain areas, plus expose how and when
there is the need to intervene.
Hotspot analysis should be treated as an iterative process. Once an area has been
identified for focus, the methods and techniques for analysing hotspots in space and
time can be re-run against the crime and disorder data for just the focus area. To
develop a profile for the focus area,
Focus area analysis should also be performed against a ‘control’. A control helps
to develop a better understanding of crime and disorder trends within a focus area
as against area wide trends. Suitable controls to use include the whole initial study
area, or the whole study area excluding the focus area. For example, if a chosen
focus area is a town centre in a local district, the district or the area of the district
excluding the town area would act as a convenient control.
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