Effect of broken windows enforcement on clearance rates

Originating in the New York City Transit System, "broken windows" enforcement has become a widely implemented policing strategy. Research testing the effectiveness of focused enforcement upon minor offenses and "uncivil" behaviors, however, has been inconclusive. There has been no study which has addressed broken windows enforcement as an explanatory factor for clearance rates. Most previous research on clearance rates were completed more than two decades ago, well before the implementation of structured broken windows enforcement. Utilizing official crime data for the thirty-five largest municipal police agencies in Texas from 1990 through 2004, this research examined the relationship between broken windows enforcement and clearance rates for UCR Part I offenses. Using hierarchical multivariate linear modeling (HMLM) analysis to capitalize upon the longitudinal characteristics of the data allowed examination of the influence of broken windows enforcement across a wide spectrum of agencies over a long time period. Broken windows enforcement showed inconsistent results across the different crime types. Broken windows enforcement had a positive impact on the clearance rates for burglaries and a marginal impact on auto theft clearance rates. In the case of larceny clearance, greater levels of broken windows arrests actually had a negative relationship. For all of the offense categories, the number of sworn officers was negatively related to the clearance rates. Crime per officer measures showed negative significant effect on the clearance rates for the property offense categories.

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