Our department is working toward thoroughly integrating data driven approaches into decision making at all levels of the department. We have been producing regular analytical products for a few years to support this goal. The operations bureau and the command staff have over this time been evolving their protocols toward a model that allows them to be increasingly receptive and responsive to incoming information provided by crime analysis. As far as crime analysis is concerned we have a great deal of room to grow and are aware of areas in which we could improve our analytical capability. Specifically we would like to improve our ability to do thorough and robust analysis quickly. This will allow us to analyze more problems and increase the sophistication of our analysis. This in turn would allow us to keep up with the increasing demand for good and frequent analytical products in our department. Additionally, as mentioned above, our department has been building the capacity for using a focused deterrence model to address violent gun crime as a means of attacking the most serious facet of our violent crime problem reducing violent crime generally. To properly support this endeavor we in the Crime Analysis Unit know that we need to have a thorough understanding of the social networks in which violent gun crime is occurring in our city. We also believe that we need to have a thorough understanding of the members and structure of the criminal networks which are most responsible for gun violence in Columbia. To this end we need to increase our skill in the use of the techniques of social network analysis (SNA) as well as our understanding of the theory of social network analysis. With improvements in these areas we hope to be able to identify the structure of the social networks that are important to gun crime in Columbia and identify what individuals in these networks are most influential, most at risk for committing future acts of gun-related violence, and most at risk for being the victims of such violence. Armed with this knowledge we hope to be able to identify individuals whose position and influence in these networks makes them the most suitable targets for intervention. The software we are currently using for our attempts at social network analysis is IBM i2 Analysts’ Notebook. Another aspect of Columbia’s violent crime problem that we feel is a component of the above request, is the tracking of firearm related offenses and NIBIN hits. Using Analyst Notebook we are able to create a visual representation of how various firearm related offenses are linked. Utilizing this NIBIN information, along with the SNA data we would be able to more accurately track firearm movement between groups. For the reasons stated above we would benefit from TTA related to 1) data linking, database management, and the automation or streamlining of analytical tasks, and 2) the theory and techniques of social network analysis. Training on the use of Analysts’ Notebook would be beneficial since this is the program we are currently using for SNA.
Violent crime reduction is the primary crime reduction goal of our agency. Our violent crime rate is approximately 2.5x the national average. Our executive leadership is particularly focused on gun-related violent crime. For years we have been working toward building protocols and analytical capabilities to support a robust and holistic effort to reduce gun violence and violent crime generally. While we have certainly made progress in this area, we are aware of some places where we still want to make improvement in regards to crime analysis.
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