Mapping Crime: Understanding Hot Spots
About This Report
Much of crime mapping is devoted to detecting high-crime-density areas known as hot spots. Hot spot analysis helps police identify high-crime areas, types of crime being committed, and the best way to respond. This report discusses hot spot analysis techniques and software and identifies when to use each one. The visual display of a crime pattern on a map should be consistent with the type of hot spot and possible police action. For example, when hot spots are at specific addresses, a dot map is more appropriate than an area map, which would be too imprecise. In this report, chapters progress in sophistication. Chapter 1 is for novices to crime mapping. Chapter 2 is more advanced,...