Bringing Geography to the Practice of Analyzing Crime Through Technology
Mapping, Spatial Analysis and Geography at the National Institute of Justice
In 1997, the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) established the Crime Mapping Research Center (CMRC) using funds for technology assistance from the fiscal year (FY) 1996 Appropriations Act. CMRC was established under the Institute’s behavioral sciences division, the Office of Research and Evaluation (ORE). The center’s primary focus was on using geographic information systems to visualize crime data and understand spatial patterns of criminal activity. Its target constituency was and is state and local law enforcement and other criminal justice organizations. In 2002, NIJ transformed CMRC into the Mapping and Analysis for Public Safety (MAPS) program. The MAPS program works toward integrating spatial statistics into the measurement of geographic crime patterns. When the program was expanded into NIJ’s Office of Science and Technology (OST), it began to examine emerging technologies (beyond software) that would be key tools in the study of crime. With mature visualization and statistical techniques for analyzing geographic data, the...