Impact of Foreclosures on Crime

[reed11b]

Check the pot and drug sentences then and now...

And then agree to agree w/ you 100% on that particular aspect.
Reed
Another way of describing the "Broken Window Theory" JMM, is the social cues theory. Basically that signs of disorder are a signal to criminals that "open" criminal activity is OK or at least unenforcible. Note that it only works on "open" criminal activity (visable activity) but that this is often the most important in "percieved" public safty. So the "broken window" enforcement has little to do with lowering actual major crime rates, but a lot to do with public perceptions of safety. Of course in COIN, public perception of safety matters.
Reed

[Ron Humphrey]

accidently left unlocked back door off the screen porch Theory to deal with the "closed" criminal activity?

[120mm]

And then agree to agree w/ you 100% on that particular aspect.
Reed
Another way of describing the "Broken Window Theory" JMM, is the social cues theory. Basically that signs of disorder are a signal to criminals that "open" criminal activity is OK or at least unenforcible. Note that it only works on "open" criminal activity (visable activity) but that this is often the most important in "percieved" public safty. So the "broken window" enforcement has little to do with lowering actual major crime rates, but a lot to do with public perceptions of safety. Of course in COIN, public perception of safety matters.
Reed

In crime, perception is everything.

My wife and I spent April in Eastern, rural Crete, which I think qualifies as being a "poor" society. Crime there is nonexistent, and when I dropped a large amount of currency, a young man followed me to return it and refused a reward.

Crime "used" to be nonexistent in the rural society where I grew up, and we were poor as dirt. However, the '60s brought the "perception" that "anything goes" and crime became common by the '70s. (I know, highly correlational, but very coincidental, if not causal...)

I spent 3.5 years or so, teaching in a prison, and will attest that the actual number of hardcore criminals in prison is actually relatively low. Something like 10% of law-breakers commit 90% of crimes. The secret isn't longer sentences, it's finding that 10% and removing them from society, one way or another.

I think more participation at the lower levels of democracy might help, too....

[jmm99]

from reed
So the "broken window" enforcement has little to do with lowering actual major crime rates, but a lot to do with public perceptions of safety.

Agreed that perception is an important aspect, but I am not a believer in the doctrine that perception is reality - sometimes, yes; sometimes, no.

How does broken window policing affect reality ? The obvious initial impact is on the minor crimes policed. However, to effectively police those crimes, LE has to become closer to the community it polices. I.e., who broke the window or who sprayed the graffiti ? Assuming that is done effectively, the contacts made within the community will eventually give data on the overall crime picture in the community, including major crimes. Some similarity to COIN operations - separate the people from the criminals.

So, the desired end result is ultimately better policing of major crimes.

Hey Slap, do I have this substantially correct ?

PS: - 120mm. Agree totally with your last 4 paragraphs (see above for my view of "perception"). Basically, the same life experience in growing up in a generally depressed mining community (where most of the mines closed between 1920-1945); and still live here (economic salvation has been two universities).

[jmm99]

WSJ
A rising tide of ‘underwater’ homeowners
1 in 6 now owe more on their mortgage then their property is worth
By James R. Hagerty and Ruth Simon
updated 5:58 p.m. ET, Wed., Oct. 8, 2008
.......
About 75.5 million U.S. households own the homes they live in. After a housing slump that has pushed values down 30 percent in some areas, roughly 12 million households, or 16 percent, owe more than their homes are worth, according to Moody's Economy.com.
......
Among mortgages on one- to four-family homes, 9.16 percent were a month or more overdue or were in foreclosure in the second quarter, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. That compared with 6.52 percent a year before and was the highest level since the association began such surveys 39 years ago.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27089919/

The mortgages in foreclosure rate is lower - Candy Crowley on CNN (Mon nite) put it at about 2%. Still that is over a million potential "problem children", with roughly 4 times that on the brink (payments overdue). The article points out that the problem varies from region to region - as has been stated here as well.

[120mm]

PS: - 120mm. Agree totally with your last 4 paragraphs (see above for my view of "perception"). Basically, the same life experience in growing up in a generally depressed mining community (where most of the mines closed between 1920-1945); and still live here (economic salvation has been two universities).

As usual, you are correct. My first sentence was too absolute.

I find the current view of poverty and crime being single-issued as eerily reminiscent of the Victorian England view of the "criminal poor".

In addition to being raised in poverty, I had a head injury in '98, and raised a family of four on part-time income, under the poverty line for the next 5 years, while I recovered. Shockingly, I did not resort to a life of crime, unless you consider feeding my family beans, rice and homemade polenta to be criminal.

[Sergeant T]

Another big contributor to the upswing in crime is that we're processing another youth bulge. Gen Y is about 70 million in size. If you get 1% turning to a life of crime that's an additional 700K beds you're gonna need in a system already bursting. Put this on top of the big numbers that are being/due to be released from corrections & you've got your crime wave.

Broken Windows is a fine approach when the community actually wants to be policed. Worked more than a few neighborhoods where residents didn't care what you were offering, they flat didn't want you there. Moskos seems to have had a similar experience in Baltimore.

JMM99: Don't we sort of have a model for how this breaks down by looking at how Detroit has played out over the last 25 or so years?

I've had a hypothetical question floating in my head for a while now: I wonder how effective the soldiers engaged in COIN would be if they could be sued every time the kicked down the wrong door, cuffed the wrong person, or discharged their weapon? Just something I ponder.

[Ron Humphrey]

I've had a hypothetical question floating in my head for a while now: I wonder how effective the soldiers engaged in COIN would be if they could be sued every time the kicked down the wrong door, cuffed the wrong person, or discharged their weapon? Just something I ponder.

and which should probably be looked at very hard in the understanding that particular portions of the polity think almost everything can/should be approached from a LE perspective. And tend to plan accordingly

[Rifleman]

I think more participation at the lower levels of democracy might help, too....

120mm,

Care to expound on that a little more please?

[slapout9]

Hi all, love this thread. Good questions are being asked. I have a few comments but since I had a root canal done today and I moving a little slow, I will respond later. Again I hope this keeps going because several good points have been raised.

[jmm99]

JMM99: Don't we sort of have a model for how this breaks down by looking at how Detroit has played out over the last 25 or so years?

Hate to tell you, but I know Milwaukee (6 hours away if you don't stop) better than Detroit (12 hours away).

Detroit has been hit by almost every negative variable you can imagine:

1. Collapse of auto industry.

2. Flight to suburbs, absentee landlords & deserted houses.

3. Problems with police force (internal affairs type) - existed when force was largely White; exists when force is largely African-American - but it seems a systemic problem, IMO; e.g.,

NY Times
National Briefing | Midwest: Michigan: Detroit Police Chief To Resign
Published: May 22, 2001
By ELIZABETH STANTON (NYT)
Detroit's police chief, Benny N. Napoleon, announced that he would resign effective July 15. Last month, Mr. Napoleon, whose department is under investigation by the Justice Department for police shootings, the arrest of homicide witnesses and the treatment of prisoners, said he would leave in January, when Mayor Dennis Archer's term ended. The chief, a 26-year veteran of the police force, said he was leaving earlier to work in the private sector. Mr. Archer appointed Mr. Napoleon as chief in 1998. Elizabeth Stanton (NYT)

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...e%20Department

and Benny's Bio (from better times - 1999):

http://www.answers.com/topic/benny-n-napoleon

4. Lousy political leadership in general. Again, some very good people. You can't get much better than Denny Archer, but he was virtually driven from office.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_Archer

I could name other decent judges, lawyers and cops; but you should get the idea by reading Napoleon's and Archer's bios.

IMO - the average person in Detroit probably wants policing - they are the ones getting hit by crime. But, they didn't like DPD 60 years ago when I first went to Big D - and probably don't much like it better today.

Others from MI (and Detroit) may well have different opinions.

[selil]

Seems like that is the message the despised "liberal intellectual elite" have been trying to spread for years. I would add that bolstering the middle-class has greater economic gains then enriching the rich.
Reed

P.S. I am a firm believer in the broken window theory, and believe it has a great deal of relevance in COIN.
Reed

Do prefer a "conservative moronic ludite" message instead? Perhaps you might want to think about less punditry like actually talking about broken window theory? Giluianni applied the same principle to squeegee men in New York.

[selil]

Check the pot and drug sentences then and now...

Marijuana wasn't illegal nationwide until what 1967 and LSD in 1969? Drug crimes have always been used against the disenfranchised classes starting with booze and carried through history.

[Ken White]

Marijuana wasn't illegal nationwide until what 1967 and LSD in 1969? Drug crimes have always been used against the disenfranchised classes starting with booze and carried through history.

incarceration rate in the 30s was far lower simply because drug crimes, a large percentage of todays sentences, didn't exist. That and other things. Lots of things are now crimes that were not in in 1967 much less in the 30s...

[selil]

incarceration rate in the 30s was far lower simply because drug crimes, a large percentage of todays sentences, didn't exist. That and other things. Lots of things are now crimes that were not in in 1967 much less in the 30s...

Using the national and various state corrections bureaus statistics between 40 and 50 percent of all people incarcerated have nothing more than non-violent drug user types of convictions (possession). It is also the largest growing segment of the prison population. The PEW study 1 in 100 shows that the United States has 1 in 100 people on some type of supervision (probation through parole) or incarceration. Roughly five times any other western nation.

[Tom Odom]

Using the national and various state corrections bureaus statistics between 40 and 50 percent of all people incarcerated have nothing more than non-violent drug user types of convictions (possession). It is also the largest growing segment of the prison population. The PEW study 1 in 100 shows that the United States has 1 in 100 people on some type of supervision (probation through parole) or incarceration. Roughly five times any other western nation.

The 2 countries with the largest percentage of their populations incarcerated:

The US

Rwanda

[reed11b]

The 2 countries with the largest percentage of their populations incarcerated:

The US

Rwanda

I had read recently that Russia had a higher percentage then the US, but not by that much. Either way, it's a wake up call that the correctional community has been aware of for years
Reed
(I work part time a juvenile correctional counselor)

[Tom Odom]

I had read recently that Russia had a higher percentage then the US, but not by that much. Either way, it's a wake up call that the correctional community has been aware of for years
Reed
(I work part time a juvenile correctional counselor)

I was flat out wrong on Rwanda--it has gone down dramatically in recent years. I remembered reading that but it was based on 2002 data. For example:

Prison population statistics

In absolute terms, the United States currently has the largest prison population in the world, with more than 2 million. In 2002, both Russia and China (the latter with a population 4 times that of the USA) also had prison populations in excess of 1 million.

As a percentage of total population, Rwanda has the largest prison population as of 2002, with more than 100,000 (of a total population of around 8 million), largely as a result of the 1994 genocide. The United States is second largest in relative numbers with 486 prisoners per 100,000 of population, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, also making it the largest in relative numbers amongst developed countries).

The Rwandan prison population was 130,000 in 1998; 102,000 in 2002; somewhere around 60,00 2006 after a 2003 decree to decongest the population. Nevertheless some 700,000 remain accused of genocide and face gacaca trials

US and Russia keep trading depending on source when you google the question

This report was interesting. Are you familiar with it or the organization?

Tom

[reed11b]

This report was interesting. Are you familiar with it or the organization?

Tom

I am familiar w/ both. Not a lot to add information wise other then the organization is fairly well respected w/i the justice community. While articles on the specific relationship between US incarceration rates and the ROW are not that common, most articles by non-partisan justice groups make mention of the disparity of US rates of incarceration to the rest of the industrialized world and the growing percentage of non-violent drug offenders on mandatory sentencing w/i the prison population. Most "get tough on crime" politicians seem to make the situation worse and actually lead to conditions were invasive criminals (i.e thieves and crimes of assault) are forced to be released earlier to make more room for drug and "three-strike" minor offenders. A note to Ken and others: most non-partisan justice organizations have also concluded that while the old adage that “10% of the criminal population commits 90% of the crime” is basically true, you can not reduce crime by 90% by incarcerating that 10% since other individuals step into the roles of the incarcerated criminals. With the exception of extremely violent criminals (murders and rapists) longer sentences tend to have little utility in either protecting the community or in acting as deterrents to crime. This is all second-hand and I can dig up the reports if anyone is interested, or you can do it yourselves. Even the federal Justice departments and agencies tend to support these findings if you wanted to start there.
Reed

[Ken White]

A note to Ken and others: most non-partisan justice organizations have also concluded that while the old adage that “10% of the criminal population commits 90% of the crime” is basically true, you can not reduce crime by 90% by incarcerating that 10% since other individuals step into the roles of the incarcerated criminals. With the exception of extremely violent criminals (murders and rapists) longer sentences tend to have little utility in either protecting the community or in acting as deterrents to crime.

I have absolutely no idea what you think I might have said that would indicate I'm not aware of or would disagree with that...

Fascinating.