Police patrol and the deterrence of crime

A nonrecursive model of the deterrent effect of police presence was formulated and tested for 26 cities. Victimization data were employed as measures of crime, unpublished FBI data on the number of police patrol units as the measure of levels of police presence, and data for 11 exogenous variables were derived from FBI and census reports. It was found that per capita, police are a positive function of rates of violent crime and that clearance rates are a positive function of police presence. However, some offenses that have traditionally been thought to be deterrable are not inversely related to clearance rates. The equations were re-estimated using official measures of crime and found to be more consistent with the deterrent hypothesis. It is suggested that official data may generate a spurious correlation. Finally, caution is suggested in consideration of alternative forms of police presence.     

Book reviews

E. Glyn Lewis, Multilingualistn in the Soviet Union: aspects of language policy and its implementation. The Hague and Paris: Mouton, 1971. xx+332pp. Dfl 62.

L. G. Churchward, The Soviet Intelligentsia. An essay on the social structure and roles of Soviet intellectuals during the 196os. London and Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1973. xiii + 204 pp. £3.25.

Galia Golan, Reform Rule in Czechoslovakia. The Dubcek Era 1968–1969. Cambridge: at the University Press, 1973. Vii + 327 pp. £5.80. $18.50.

Otto Ul?, The Judge in a Communist State. A View from Within. Athens, Ohio: Ohio UP, 1972. xiv + 307 pp. $8.75.

Robert M. Slusser, The Berlin Crisis of 1961: Soviet‐American relations and the struggle for power in the Kremlin, June‐November 1961. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins UP, 1973. xvi + 509 pp. $17.50. £7.90.

Edward Taborsky, Communist Penetration of the Third World. New York: Robert Speller & Sons, 1973. iii + 500 pp. $12.50.

Philip R. Pryde, Conservation in the Soviet Union. London: Cambridge UP, 1972. xv + 301 pp. £5.00.

Marshall I. Goldman, The Spoils of Progress: Environmental Pollution in the Soviet Union. Cambridge, Mass, and London: The M.I.T. Press, 1972. xi + 372 pp. $7.95. £3.60.

Robert H. McNeal, Bride of the Revolution. Krupskaya and Lenin. London: Victor Gollancz, 1973. 326 pp. £3.60.

George Katkov et al. (eds.), Russia Enters the Twentieth Century 1894–1917. London: Methuen, 1973. 352 pp. £1.50 (paperback).

Paul Craig Roberts and M. Stephenson, Marx's Theory of Exchange, Alienation and Crisis. Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1973. 127 pp. $5.50.

W. H. Parker, The Russians: How They Live and Work. Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1973. 179 pp. £2.50.

Wright Miller, Who are the Russians? A History of the Russian People. London: Faber & Faber, 1973. 240 pp. £3.95.     

Public hospitals on the brink: their problems and their options

This article defines the differences among public community hospitals, and examines the problems faced by those that serve primarily the poor. The article analyzes the impacts of (1) the tradition of local fiscal responsibility, (2) third-party funding arrangements, (3) public hospitals' bases of political support, and (4) problems in governance and administration. Three broad policy options for public hospitals are considered in the light of these impacts.     

Effects of victims' characteristics on attitudes toward hate crimes

Hate crimes are motivated by perpetrators' prejudice toward targets' group. To examine individuals' attitudes toward hate crime perpetrators and targets, participants responded to vignettes of court cases in which the victim's group membership was varied. Results showed that participants recommended more severe sentences for perpetrators when the targets of their crimes were not White males or White females and reported those crimes as more closely fitting the definition of "hate crime." These results show that participants consider penalty enhancements appropriate for hate crimes and that they do not consider crimes against women to be hate crimes, consistent with present hate crime legislation. These results have implications for the utility and support of hate crime legislation but may showcase the resistance to expanding the legislation to protect individuals of other groups, especially women.     

Bank security dye packs: synthesis, isolation, and characterization of chlorinated products of bleached 1-(methylamino)anthraquinone

Banknote evidence is often submitted after a suspect has attempted to disguise or remove red dye stain that has been released because of an anti-theft device that activates after banknotes have been unlawfully removed from bank premises. Three chlorinated compounds have been synthesized as forensic chemical standards to indicate bank security dye bleaching as a suspect's intentional method for masking a robbery involving dye pack release on banknotes. A novel, facile synthetic method to provide three chlorinated derivatives of 1-(methylamino)anthraquinone (MAAQ) is presented. The synthetic route involved Ultra Clorox bleach as the chlorine source, iron chloride as the catalyst, and MAAQ as the starting material and resulted in a three-component product mixture. Two mono-chlorinated isomers (2-chloro-1-(methylamino)anthraquinone and 4-chloro-1-(methylamino)anthraquinone) and one di-chlorinated compound (2,4-dichloro-1-(methylamino)anthraquinone) of the MAAQ parent molecule were detected by gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC-MS), and subsequently isolated by liquid chromatography (LC) with postcolumn fraction collection. Although GC-MS is sensitive enough to detect all of the chlorinated products, it is not definitive enough to identify the structural isomers. Liquid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy was utilized to elucidate structurally the ortho- and para-mono-chlorinated isomers once enough material was properly isolated. A reaction mechanism involving iron is proposed to explain the presence of chlorinated MAAQ species on stolen banknotes after attempted bleaching.