Narrow Results

We extend an agent-based model of crime-pattern formation initiated in Short et al. by incorporating the effects of law enforcement agents. We investigate the effect that these agents have on the spatial distribution and overall level of criminal activity in a simulated urban setting. Our focus is on a two-dimensional lattice model of residential burglaries, where each site (target) is characterized by a dynamic attractiveness to burglary and where criminal and law enforcement agents are represented by random walkers. The dynamics of the criminal agents and the target-attractiveness field are, with certain modifications, as described in Short et al. Here the dynamics of enforcement agents are affected by the attractiveness field via a biasing of the walk, the detailed rules of which define a deployment strategy. We observe that law enforcement agents, if properly deployed, will in fact reduce the total amount of crime, but their relative effectiveness depends on the number of agents deployed, the deployment strategy used, and spatial distribution of criminal activity.

For certain policing strategies, continuum PDE models can be derived from the discrete systems. The continuum models are qualitatively similar to the discrete systems at large system sizes.

This paper provides an overview of the current state of knowledge about small business scams. A scam is a form of dishonest action, based upon an invitation to participate in an activity. Victims are encouraged, mislead or induced to voluntarily interact with the perpetrator, and ultimately to willingly surrender over money, information or other valuable resources. Common forms of scams directed towards small business include phishing, false business valuations and sales, fake overpayments, false directory and advertisement listings, bust-outs, blowing, cramming, advance fee fraud and misleading self-employment projects. The limited research evidence available to date suggests that small enterprises are particularly vulnerable to these types of criminal activity, are less inclined to report such events, are likely to be subject to repeat attacks, and are particularly susceptible to online scams. This occurs because small businesses often lack the in-house skills, resources and reporting arrangements needed to effectively detect and prevent scams. The paper also briefly examines the entrepreneurial nature of scammers, and explores some of the emergent literature on the psychology of small business scams that may explain scam propensity. Strategies for combating and avoiding scams are discussed, as are suggestions for future research directions in the area.

In this paper, we analyse a differential game describing the interactions between a potential offender and the law enforcement agency. We assume that both players want to maximise their welfare expressed in monetary units, and compare the results obtained by applying the Nash equilibrium concept under symmetric with that under asymmetric information. The comparison reveals that under asymmetric information the offence rate is lower, due to the deterrence caused by the activities of the law enforcement agency. Both players' controls start at a steady state value and stick to it until close to the end of the planning horizon, when they leave the steady state to take into account the scrap value; this can be interpreted as a turnpike property of Nash equilibria. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis is carried out. Among others, it turns out that a myopic offender tends to a higher offence level.

This article provides an extension of the Fend-Feichtinger-Tragler dynamic game of offending and law enforcement to a stochastic framework. This allows the analysis to reflect actual crime statistics which displays randomness in its distribution. Stochastic paths of crimes are derived. The asymptotic stationary distribution of crime records is also obtained.

This paper analyzes whether the behavior of potential offenders can be guided by information on the actual detection probability transmitted by the policy maker. It is established that, when viewed as a cheap-talk game, the existence of equilibria with information transmission depends on the level of the sanction, the level of costs related to imposing the sanction, and the level of social harm resulting from the offense. In addition, we find that the policy maker (i. e., society as a whole) is not necessarily better off ex ante when more information is transmitted in equilibrium, but that potential offenders always are.

IT business value research examines the organizational performance impacts of information technology. In this paper, we apply the value configuration of the value shop to describe and measure organizational performance. The value shop consists of the five primary activities of problem understanding, solutions to problems, decisions on actions, implementation of actions, and evaluations of actions in an iterative problem-solving cycle. Police investigation work is defined as value shop activities. Our empirical study of Norwegian police results in significant relationships between information technology use and investigation performance for all primary activities. The most important primary activities for IT use are problem understanding and implementation of actions, as both significantly improve value shop performance.

This chapter provides a comprehensive discussion of the deterrence properties of a competition policy regime. On the basis of the economic theory of law enforcement, we identify several factors that are likely to affect its degree of deterrence: (1) sanctions and damages; (2) financial and human resources; (3) powers during the investigation; (4) quality of the law; (5) independence; and (6) separation of powers. We then discuss how to measure deterrence. We review the literature that uses surveys to solicit direct information on changes in the behavior of firms due to the threats posed by the enforcement of antitrust rules, and the literature based on the analysis of hard data. Finally, we argue that the most challenging task both theoretically and empirically is how to distinguish between “good” and “bad” deterrence.