Rachel Armitage

Gang Member: Who Says? Definitional and Structural Issues

Owing to a number of high-profile shootings in the UK over the past decade, there has been a significant amount of media and political interest in youth gangs. This chapter reports on a study conducted in 2009 in a large city in the North of England. It discusses the structure and formation of gangs in this city from the view of the young people identified as gang members and those responsible for this identification, i.e., police officers. Findings demonstrated that few of the young people viewed themselves as belonging to a gang; indeed, many were scathing of such an attribution, contesting its applicability. A more accurate description of these young people is of a rather loose and fluid, interlinked but informal social network of friends and associates. There was evidence that the authorities’ labeling of some young people as gang members and adoption and use of gang names attributed coherence and identity to what was often only fluid and transitional youth group formations. This may have created the very circumstances it sought to challenge.

Local variations in reporting deaths to the coroner in England and Wales: a postcode lottery?

Aims In England and Wales, doctors are charged with a responsibility either to report a death to the coroner or issue a medical certificate specifying cause of death. A lack of formal prescriptive or presumptive oversight has resulted in the promulgation by individual coroners of local reporting regimes. The study reported here identified overall and gendered variations in local reporting rates to coroners across the jurisdictions of England and Wales, consistent over time. Methods Analysis was performed on Ministry of Justice (MOJ) data pertaining to the numbers and proportions of deaths reported to the coroner by jurisdiction over a 10-year period (2001–2010). Office of National Statistics (ONS) data provided the numbers of deaths registered in England and Wales over the same period to serve as a denominator for the calculation of proportions. Where coroner jurisdictions (and local authorities) had been amalgamated during this period, the combined reported and registered death figures have been included in line with the current jurisdiction areas. Results While reporting rates for individual jurisdictions were found to be stable over the 10-year period, wide local variations in reporting deaths to coroners were found with no obvious demographic explanation. The gender of the deceased was identified as a major factor in local variation. Conclusions The decision to report a death to the coroner varies across jurisdictions. Implications for coronial investigations are discussed and the need for wider research into coroners’ decision-making is proposed.

Is It Just a Guessing Game? The Application of Crime Prevention through Environmental Design (CPTED) to Predict Burglary

ABSTRACT Crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED) aims to reduce crime through the design of the built environment. Designing out crime officers (DOCOs) are responsible for the delivery of CPTED by assessing planning applications, identifying criminogenic design features and offering remedial advice. Twenty-eight experienced DOCOs from across England and Wales assessed the site plan for one residential development (which had been built a decade earlier) and identified crime risk locations. Predictions of likely locations were compared with 4 years’ police recorded crime data. DOCOs are, to varying extents, able to identify locations which experienced higher levels of crime and disorder. However, they varied widely in the number of locations in which they anticipated burglary would occur.

Practical Challenges and New Research Frontiers in Retail Crime and Its Prevention

This final chapter is composed of four parts: a summary of the results, the cross-cutting common themes, the book limitations and a future research agenda linked to policy recommendations. This cha ...

Can We Ever Know Which Objects Thieves Most Desire

This edited collection provides an original and comprehensive take on retail crime and its prevention, by combining international data and multidisciplinary perspectives from criminologists, econom ...

Retail Crime: Aim, Scope, Theoretical Framework and Definitions

This chapter provides an introduction to the theme retail crime, the book scope, theoretical framework and key definitions used to structure this edited volume and support the reading of the chapters. Retail crime encompasses any criminal act against a store, a company or a conglomerate of companies, their properties as well as their employees and customers. The book also explores how the use of technology reduces crime but may also create new crime opportunities, some linked to organised criminal organisations far away from where crime occurs. This chapter also illustrates how this edited volume contributes to the current knowledge base by characterising the dynamics of retail crime from a multidisciplinary and international perspective with examples from Australia, Brazil, England, Israel, Italy, the UK and the US.

Crime Prevention through Environmental Design (CPTED) and retail crime: Exploring offender perspectives on risk and protective factors in the design and layout of retail environments.

There is little doubt that the design of the built environment influences offender decision-making. Crime Prevention through Environmental Design (CPTED) is a crime reduction approach that aims to prevent crime though the design (pre-build) or manipulation (post-build) of the built environment. CPTED is based upon a set of principles that include movement control, surveillance, defensible space and physical security, and research (see Armitage, Crime Prevention Through Housing Design: Policy and Practice. Crime Prevention and Security Management. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013 for overview) has demonstrated the effectiveness of CPTED in reducing crimes such as burglary within the residential environment. This research explores the extent to which CPTED (and other design related) measures can be used to reduce shoplifting within a retail environment—namely two major supermarket chains in England. The results reveal that the principles of CPTED are relevant within the retail environment and that offenders are deterred by these features, in particular, where these principles result in an immediate (as opposed to delayed) detection or apprehension. Whilst the research is conducted in supermarkets within England, the conclusions are internationally relevant and can be transferred to many different retail environments.

Mission impossible? Assessing the veracity of a mental health problem as result of a road traffic accident: a preliminary review of UK experts’ practices

ABSTRACT The number of people claiming for personal injury after being involved in a road traffic accident (RTA) in the UK continues to soar. In April 2015, the UK Government intervened to implement measures aimed at reducing the prevalence of fraud within such personal injury claims. However, these reforms did not include claims for mental disorder that arise because of a RTA despite being responsible for substantially larger payouts in comparison with claims for whiplash. The present study examines the assessment practice for detecting fraudulent claims of this nature using a mixed methods survey analysing UK medico-legal professionals’ assessment methodologies (N = 37). The findings suggest comprehensively that assessment practices in this field are idiosyncratic. The findings evidence limitations in all aspects of the assessment process from medico-legal assessors being asked to undertake examinations without the presence of medical records to 44% of examiners being unaware of the three types of malingering. The article concludes with recommendations for improving both assessments and the assessment process for assessing RTA claimants in the UK.

The Impact of Surveillance on Levels of Crime and Fear of Crime

This chapter reviews the research evidence regarding the impact of surveillance on levels of crime and makes design suggestions to improve residential developments. Surveillance refers to the way that an area is designed to maximise the ability of formal (security guards, police, employees) or informal (residents, passers-by, shoppers) users of the space to observe suspicious behaviour. Within situational crime prevention more generally, surveillance may include the installation of CCTV or the use of formal security guards — these interventions are often referred to as formal or mechanical surveillance. However, within the field of designing out crime, surveillance rarely relates to formal measures, but refers more to the informal or natural surveillance created through measures such as ensuring that houses are overlooked by neighbouring properties, that dwelling entrances face the street, that rooms facing the street are active (such as the kitchen or living room) and that sightlines are not obstructed by shrubbery or high walls. Much of the evidence relating to surveillance as a crime reduction measure focuses upon formal or mechanical surveillance — in particular CCTV, the employment of security guards and measures such as street lighting, to enhance their performance. As the focus of this book is residential design, and the ways in which the environment can be planned to reduce crime risks, this chapter will focus solely upon informal surveillance — that which takes place between users of the space, by the residents, those working in the area or those simply passing by.

Can Designing Out Crime Interventions Sustain Crime Reduction Benefits

This chapter presents the findings of an evaluation into SBD housing within West Yorkshire, England. The scheme is presented in detail in Chapter 2, alongside findings relating to its efficacy as a crime reduction measure. The study which forms the basis of this chapter focuses, not simply upon the effectiveness of the scheme, but also on whether the benefits can be sustained over a ten-year period (1999– 2009). The rationale for including a second evaluation of the scheme is to focus not upon whether SBD can reduce crime and the fear of crime, but upon whether that benefit retains its impact. The factors upon which SBD is based include physical security measures such as locks, windows, doors and fencing, but also design features relating to the layout of a property and the development within which it is based, but which should be sustained over a longer period of time — arguably, the lifetime of the development.