Policing Hot Spots of Crime

This is an incredibly important collection of scientific works and essays. Weisburd presents a powerful narrative on how practical criminological theories, the willingness of police departments to experiment with new crime preventions ideas, and persistence of a small group of scholars can shift scientific paradigms and policy conversations. The nearly four decades of hot spots policing research and development efforts led by Weisburd and his colleagues obliterated status quo narratives that “police do not prevent crime”, “place-based crime prevention leads to crime displacement”, and “policing harms rather than helps communities.” The world is a safer and fairer place because of the work presented here. This book should be mandatory reading for police executives, mayors and city managers, scholars, and students interested in effective crime prevention policy and practice.

Anthony A. Braga, University of Pennsylvania

Professor Weisburd has curated a wonderful and deeply thoughtful collection of papers for a book that spans both the history and future of crime hotspots and evidence to guide policing best practice. An anthology of this kind could only ever come from Weisburd and his teams of students and colleagues bringing together over nearly four decades of careful research and scholarly insight. With clear historical recollections of how the law of crime concentration emerged and how this “law” must be understood and acted upon by police, Weisburd and Cody Telep’s conclusion charts the way forward for future research, policy and practice considering the “big science” approach for making our streets, communities and cities safer for generations to come.

Lorraine Mazerolle AC, The University of Queensland