Changing How Police View Arrest: The Critical Role of Police in Criminal Justice Reform

• In Event: Roundtable: Rethinking Pretrial Practice and Building a National Research Agenda for the Front End of the Criminal Justice System

Abstract

Despite significant national reductions in crime over the past three decades, there has not been a comparable reduction in adult arrest rates. A key inquiry that must be addressed by both academics and practitioners is whether or not it is possible to simultaneously reduce crime and the number of arrests. The City of Cincinnati (Hamilton County) Ohio provided an opportunity to examine this unanswered question when it closed the Queensgate Correctional Facility in 2008, thereby reducing the available jail space in the county by 36%. Relying upon an interrupted time series analysis, our findings show that both crime and arrests were reduced in Cincinnati even after the jail closure. Importantly, our findings demonstrate that the previous downward trend in Cincinnati reported crimes was not interrupted with the loss of over one-third of the available jail space in Hamilton County. This was accomplished in part by changing how the Cincinnati Police department viewed the use of arrest – as a limited commodity. The evidence suggests that the police can have a significant impact on pretrial justice and other criminal justice reform efforts through the implementation of evidence-based policing strategies that seek to simultaneously reduce crime and reduce the use of arrest.

Authors

• Robin S. Engel, University of Cincinnati

• Nicholas Corsaro, University of Cincinnati

• Murat Ozer, University of Cincinnati