A city-level analysis of property crime clearance rates

Theft, burglary, and vehicle theft are among the most frequently committed and least commonly cleared Part I offenses in the United States, but have received disproportionately little attention in the clearance literature. This study contributes to recent efforts to remedy this shortage by presenting offense-specific analyses of burglary, larceny, and vehicle theft clearance rates in a sample of 110 large US cities. Data were gathered from the Uniform Crime Report, the Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics survey, and the American Community Survey. Independent variables comprised social disorganization measures (e.g. residential instability, poverty, etc.) and policing variables, including the use of broken windows policing. Although broken windows policing is related to higher clearance rates in a few prior studies, that effect was not observed in the present work. Racial diversity and police spending per capita (which were negatively associated with clearance rates) were the only variables that were significantly associated with the clearance of all three crimes.     

“机动车一方”:道路交通事故赔偿义务人解析

我国法律对确认承担无过错责任的机动车一方的规定并不明确,理论和实践中存在不同的观点和做法。本文首先研究了作为机动车一方的赔偿义务人的认定标准,通过分析危险责任的理论基础,得出保有者是真正的赔偿义务人的结论。文章根据实际支配力+运行收益的标准分析了转让而未过户、借用、租赁、被盗窃或抢劫及挂靠营运等实践中比较普遍的情形下赔偿义务人的具体认定,并通过与机动车第三者责任强制保险比较,讨论了机动车第三者责任商业保险中保险人的赔偿义务问题。     

机动车登记中的物权保护问题探析

对于机动车的权属问题,有必要立足于物权的基本原理,从私法和公法的双重角度进行理论分析和立法调整。本文认为,机动车登记行为具有行政确认和行政许可的双重法律属性,公安机关在办理机动车登记中对相关事实的审查属于实质审查。《物权法》对机动车登记效力采取的是登记对抗主义而非登记要件主义。对于登记中的错误应区分具体情形,采取不同的方式予以补救。对于第三人善意购买的被盗抢机动车,应当采取有偿回复的方式予以处理,不宜不加区分地予以追缴。     

Characterization of the triacylglycerol crystal formation in adipose tissue during a vehicle collision

The unusual appearance of crystalline fat structures was observed during the postmortem examination of a motor vehicle accident victim. The crystal structures were characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and x-ray diffractometry. The structures were found to be made of triacylglycerols, a dominant lipid structure found in human adipose tissue, capable of forming various polymorphic structures. The morphology of the crystalline material was found using both techniques to be predominantly the beta' form of triacylglycerols. The accelerated growth of such triacylglycerol morphology has been observed as a result of shear stresses in other studies involving edible fats. As a result of the findings of this study, it is proposed that increased shear forces may be responsible for the formation of the unusual fat structure found in the victim. An understanding of the effect of forces on the structure of body fat in high-impact collisions can potentially assist in verifying a high-velocity impact.     

Predicting Initiator and Near Repeat Events in Spatiotemporal Crime Patterns: An Analysis of Residential Burglary and Motor Vehicle Theft

Near repeat analysis has been increasingly used to measure the spatiotemporal clustering of crime in contemporary criminology. Despite its predictive capacity, the typically short time frame of near repeat crime patterns can negatively affect the crime prevention utility of near repeat analysis. Thus, recent research has argued for a greater understanding of the types of places that are most likely to generate near repeat crime patterns. The current study contributes to the literature through a spatiotemporal analysis of residential burglary and motor vehicle theft in Indianapolis, IN. Near Repeat analyses were followed by multinomial logistic regression models to identify covariates related to the occurrence of initiator (the first event in a near repeat chain) and near repeat (the subsequent event in a near repeat chain) events. The overall findings provide additional support for the argument that neighborhood context can influence the formation and context of spatiotemporal crime patterns.     

监控视频中车辆平均速度测算方法比较

根据车辆速度计算公式,提出了两种基于监控视频测速的思路。一是视频图像与实地测量相结合,车辆运动距离通过与监控画面匹配后实地测量,运动时间通过视频帧率运算分别获得。二是利用车辆技术参数测量,在视频图像中,车身前后明显部位经过同一点,车辆运动距离和时间分别通过被测车型技术参数、视频帧率运算获得。并通过实验结果对两种方法进行评价。     

Managing Victim Confrontation: Auto Theft and Informal Sanction Threats

Objectives. This paper explores how offenders manage the prospect of victim confrontation during auto theft. Methods. Data were drawn from in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 35 active offenders recruited from the streets of a large Midwestern US city using snowball sampling methods. Results. Two contextual domains figured prominently in the offenders’ decision-making calculus: The area around the target and the target itself. The first galvanized the offenders’ attention to, and management of, informal social control. The second enjoined offenders to balance speed and stealth in breaching the target. Conclusions. Victim confrontation is an informal sanction that is distinct from both retaliation and traditional extralegal sanctions. The rarity with which it occurs in auto theft is likely due to confrontation avoidance measures offenders adopt at the front end of the offense and during the enactment process itself. The conceptual implications of victim confrontation in crime are explored in relation to the following five areas: (1) sanction celerity and present orientation; (2) sanction certainty and ambiguity aversion; (3) sanction interdependence; (4) violence avoidance; and (5) directions for future research.     

Two Simple Formulas for Evaluating the Lower Bound of the Impact Velocity in Vehicle–pedestrian Accidents

Formulas for evaluating the lower bound of the impact velocity are valuable in vehicle–pedestrian accident reconstruction. The theory of classical mechanics and four hypotheses were employed to derive formulas; the research results and simulation/accident tests were employed to validate their feasibility. Then, two simple formulas were developed according to the distance between the rest positions of the vehicle and the pedestrian and the flight‐phase distance. The results showed that the evaluated results by the two proposed formulas are inferior to the existing results. The influence of a roadside step on the impact velocity, which decreased with an increase in the flight‐phase distance and a reduction in the road slope, was evaluated. Based on a real accident, the study concludes that the lower bound can be easily obtained with the proposed formulas, which can be used to determine the evaluated impact velocity during simulations.     

更改机动车辆号码的常见方法及检验

更改机动车辆车架号码和发动机号码是犯罪分子的惯用伎俩,常用方法有割改法、填改法、添减笔画法、添减阿拉伯数字法和移位法等。发现车辆号码更改的方法有观察车辆驾驶室内仪表盘,观察车辆发动机号码平台,以及牢记各类型车辆的发动机号码和车辆车架号码的字体特征、打印部位、打印方式、倾斜角度等特征,并进行比对。显现变动的车辆号码的方法一般用化学试剂显现。