Co-Offending and Crime Location Choice

• In Event: Crime and Place: Opportunity and Offending

Abstract

Previous research has confirmed crime pattern theory showing that an offender’s awareness space is important in crime location choice: offenders often commit crimes in their own current and past residential areas, in areas they previously targeted, and in the current and past residential areas of their close family members. However, previous studies on crime location choice often implicitly assumed a single decision-maker, whereas many crimes are actually committed by groups of offenders. This study explicitly addresses how co-offending affects crime location choices. It builds upon previous crime location choice studies in the Greater The Hague area by studying to what extent the combined awareness spaces of co-offenders influence their crime location choices.

Authors

• Marre Lammers, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement

• Barbara Menting, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement

• Stijn Ruiter, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement

• Wim Bernasco, NSCR