Police Responses to Micro-Grid Crime Prediction Technology: Grounded Theorizing

• In Event: Crime and Place: Philadelphia Predictive Policing Experiment: An Update

Abstract

This paper examines the complex dynamics accompanying the introduction of micro-grid crime prediction technology, on an experimental basis, into the nation’s fourth largest police department. Researchers rode along in marked and unmarked cars patrolling predicted crime areas and took extensive field notes. Grounded theorizing revealed: 1) disbelief among some officers that new technology could replicate the results of ‘old knowledge’ and the ‘crafts’ of traditional policing practices; 2) struggles in some sites with successful implementation of the new software into day-to-day district operations; 3) variation in informal officer-citizen interactions within the predicted crime areas; 4) differing perspectives on the potential benefits of incorporating highly-focused patrols of predicted micro-grids into daily police operations. Highlighting the innovative technology’s potential enhancements to the traditional police crafts of communication and intelligence gathering may transform what appears to be a black box of impersonal technology into a more widely accepted tool in policing.

Authors

• Ryan Fisher, Temple University

• Jerry Ratcliffe, Temple University

• Ralph Brecken Taylor, Temple University

• Christopher Naimo, Temple University