Update on Geospatial Patterns of Precursor Behavior among Terrorists
Introduction
As part of the Terrorism and Extremist Violence in the United States (TEVUS) database integration effort, researchers at the Terrorism Research Center in Fulbright College at the University of Arkansas and University of Oklahoma have been adding: 1) federal terrorism court cases and associated data and 2) incident and precursor geospatial data from these court cases to the American Terrorism Study (ATS) in order to examine geospatial patterns in terrorist behavior and determine if the patterns identified in earlier studies have changed significantly. The ATS allows examination of a number of different units of analysis. Analyses may examine: (1) characteristics of federal terrorism court cases; (2) the characteristics of persons indicted in each court case or involved in incidents, otherwise referred to as indictees; (3) characteristics of incidents and planned incidents; and (4) precursor activities that lead up to the incident and are necessary to carry it out and/or achieve the goals of the persons or groups.