Our study explores whether certain establishments repel crime in a high-crime neighborhood. We draw on interviews with 35 neighborhood insiders in 2014 and 2015, consisting of ex-offenders, residents, and police. We examine the spatial relationships between places identified by participants—churches, parks, and community gardens—and calls for service (CFS) using Ripley’s network bivariate K-function. Community gardens were associated with repulsion consistently, but only reached statistical significance for drug-related CFS. Churches were associated with both crime repulsion and attraction. Parks show evidence of repulsion for drug CFS at certain distances and for violent CFS. In sum, while qualitative data suggest compelling possibilities for certain establishments to repel crime, quantitative results are mixed about the reality.
AmgadM.ItohA.TsuiM. M. K. (2015). Extending Ripley’s K-function to quantify aggregation in 2-D grayscale images. PLoS One, 10(12), e0144404.
2.
AmrheinV.GreenlandS.McShaneB. (2019). Scientists rise up against statistical significance. Nature, 567(7748), 305–307.
3.
AndersonE. (1978). A place on the corner: A study of black street corner men. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
4.
AndersonE. (1999). Code of the street: Decency, violence, and the moral life of the inner city. New York: W. W. Norton.
5.
BaddeleyA.JammalamadakaA.NairG. (2014). Multitype point process analysis of spines on the dendrite network of a neuron. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series C: Applied Statistics, 63, 673–694.
6.
BaddeleyA.RubakE.TurnerR. (2015). Spatial point patterns: Methodology and applications with R. CRC press.
7.
BeamD. R.SzaboA.OlsonJ.HoffmanL.BeyerK. M. (2021). Vacant lot to community garden conversion and crime in Milwaukee: A difference-in-differences analysis. Injury prevention, 27(5), 403–408.
8.
BernascoW.BlockR. (2011). Robberies in Chicago: A block-level analysis of the influence of crime generators, crime attractors, and offender anchor points. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 48(1), 33–57.
9.
BeavonD. J.BrantinghamP. L.BrantinghamP. J. (1994). The influence of street networks on the patterning of property offenses. Crime Prevention Studies, 2(2), 115–148.
10.
BoessenA.ChamberlainA. W. (2017). Neighborhood crime, the housing crisis, and geographic space: Disentangling the consequences of foreclosure and vacancy. Journal of Urban Affairs, 39(8), 1122–1137.
11.
BoessenA.HippJ. R. (2018). Parks as crime inhibitors or generators: Examining parks and the role of their nearby context. Social Science Research, 76, 186–201.
12.
BöhmA. (2004). Theoretical coding: Text analysis in grounded theory. In FlickU.KardoffE.SteineI. (Eds.), A Companion to Qualitative Research (pp. 270-275). London: SAGE publications.
13.
BranasC. C.SouthE.KondoM. C.HohlB. C.BourgoisP.WiebeD. J.MacDonaldJ. M. (2018). Citywide cluster randomized trial to restore blighted vacant land and its effects on violence, crime, and fear. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 115(12), 2946–2951.
14.
BrantinghamP.BrantinghamP. (1995). Criminality of place: Crime generators and crime attractors. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, 3, 5–26.
15.
BrantinghamP.BrantinghamP. (2013). Crime pattern theory. In WortleyR.TownsleyM. (Eds.), Environmental Criminology and Crime Analysis (pp. 100-116). Willan.
16.
Clampet-LundquistS.CarrP. J.KefalasM. J. (2015). The sliding scale of snitching: A qualitative examination of snitching in three Philadelphia communities. Sociological Forum, 30(2), 265–285.
17.
CohenA. K. (1955). Delinquent boys: The culture of the gang. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.
18.
CohenL. E.FelsonM. (2010). Social change and crime rate trends: A routine activity approach (1979). In Classics in environmental criminology (pp. 203-232). Routledge.
19.
CurtisA.CurtisJ. W.ShookE.SmithS.JefferisE.PorterL.SchuchL.FelixC.KerndtP. R. (2015). Spatial video geonarratives and health: Case studies in post-disaster recovery, crime, mosquito control and tuberculosis in the homeless. International Journal of Health Geographics, 14, 1–15.
20.
De BiasiA. (2017). Transforming vacant lots: Investigating an alternative approach to reducing fear of crime. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 50, 125–137.
21.
Du BoisW. E. B. (Ed.). (1898). Some efforts of American Negroes for their own social betterment (No. 3). Atlanta University Press.
22.
EckJ. E. (2003). Preventing crime at places. In FarringtonD. P.MacKenzieD. L.ShermanL.WelshB. C. (Eds.), Evidence-based crime prevention (pp. 255–308). Routledge.
23.
EckJ. E.Madensen-HeroldT. D. (2018). Place management, guardianship, and the establishment of order. In NaginD. S.CullenF. T.JonsonC. L. (Eds.), Deterrence, Choice, and Crime, Volume 23 (pp. 269-307). Routledge.
FelsonM.CohenL. E. (1980). Human ecology and crime: A routine activity approach. Human Ecology, 8, 389-406.
27.
FelsonR. B.MessnerS. F.HoskinA. W.DeaneG. (2002). Reasons for reporting and not reporting domestic violence to the police. Criminology, 40(3), 617–648.
28.
GorhamM. R.WaliczekT. M.SnelgroveA.ZajicekJ. M. (2009). The impact of community gardens on numbers of property crimes in urban Houston. HortTechnology, 19(2), 291–296.
29.
GroffE. R.LockwoodB. (2014). Criminogenic facilities and crime across street segments in Philadelphia: Uncovering evidence about the spatial extent of facility influence. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 51(3), 277–314.
30.
GroffE.McCordE. S. (2012). The role of neighborhood parks as crime generators. Security journal, 25, 1–24.
31.
HabermanC. P.RatcliffeJ. H. (2015). Testing for temporally differentiated relationships among potentially criminogenic places and census block street robbery counts. Criminology, 53(3), 457–483.
32.
HanB.CohenD. A.DeroseK. P.LiJ.WilliamsonS. (2018). Violent crime and park use in low-income urban neighborhoods. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 54(3), 352–358.
33.
JacobsJ. (1961). The death and life of great American cities. New York: Vintage Books.
34.
KimptonA.CorcoranJ.WickesR. (2017). Greenspace and crime: An analysis of greenspace types, neighboring composition, and the temporal dimensions of crime. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 54(3), 303–337.
35.
MarquetO.HippJ. A.AlbericoC.HuangJ. H.FryD.MazakE.LovasiG. S.FloydM. F. (2019). Short-term associations between objective crime, park-use, and park-based physical activity in low-income neighborhoods. Preventive Medicine, 126, 1005735.
36.
MarunaS.CopesH. (2005). What have we learned from five decades of neutralization research?Crime and Justice, 32, 221–320.
37.
MorrisA. D. (1984). The origins of the civil rights movement. Simon and Schuster.
38.
Patillo-McCoyM. (1998). Church culture as a strategy of action in the black community. American Sociological Review, 63, 767–784.
39.
PorterL. C.De BiasiA.MitchellS.CurtisA.JefferisE. (2019). Understanding the criminogenic properties of vacant housing: A mixed methods approach. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 56(3), 378–411.
40.
PorterL. C.CurtisA.JefferisE.MitchellS. (2020). Where’s the crime? Exploring divergences between call data and perceptions of local crime. The British Journal of Criminology, 60(2), 444–467.
41.
RengertG. F. (1997). Auto theft in central Philadelphia. Policing for prevention: Reducing crime, public intoxication and injury, 7, 199–219.
42.
RomanC. G.ReidS. E. (2012). Assessing the relationship between alcohol outlets and domestic violence: Routine activities and the neighborhood environment. Violence and victims, 27(5), 811–828.
43.
RoncekD. W.MaierP. A. (1991). Bars, blocks, and crimes revisited: Linking the theory of routine activities to the empiricism of “hot spots”. Criminology, 29(4), 725–753.
44.
RosenfeldR.JacobsB. A.WrightR. (2003). Snitching and the code of the street. British Journal of Criminology, 43(2), 291–309.
45.
ShepleyM.SachsN.SadatsafaviH.FournierC.PedittoK. (2019). The impact of green space on violent crime in urban environments: An evidence synthesis. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16(24), 5119.
46.
ShermanL. W.GartinP. R.BuergerM. E. (1989). Hot spots of predatory crime: Routine activities and the criminology of place. Criminology, 27(1), 27–56.
47.
SlocumL. A.RengifoA. F.ChoiT.HerrmannC. R. (2013). The elusive relationship between community organizations and crime: An assessment across disadvantaged areas of the South Bronx. Criminology, 51(1), 167–216.
48.
SykesG. M.MatzaD. (1957). Techniques of neutralization: A theory of delinquency. American Sociological Review, 22(6), 664–670.
49.
TaylorE. (2014). Honour among thieves? How morality and rationality influence the decision-making processes of convicted domestic burglars. Criminology & Criminal Justice, 14(4), 487–502.
WarnerB. D.KonkelR. H. (2019). Neighborhood churches and their relationship to neighborhood processes important for crime prevention. Journal of Urban Affairs, 41(8), 1183–1204.
52.
WarnerB. D.PierceG. L. (1993). Reexamining social disorganization theory using calls to the police as a measure of crime. Criminology, 31(4), 493–517.
53.
WeisburdD. (2015). The law of crime concentration and the criminology of place. Criminology, 53(2), 133–157.
54.
WeisburdD.BushwayS.LumC.YangS. M. (2004). Trajectories of crime at places: A longitudinal study of street segments in the city of Seattle. Criminology, 42(2), 283–322.
55.
WheelerD. C. (2007). A comparison of spatial clustering and cluster detection techniques for childhood leukemia incidence in Ohio, 1996–2003. International Journal of Health Geographics, 6(1), 1–16.
56.
WheelerA. P.KimD. Y.PhillipsS. W. (2018). The effect of housing demolitions on crime in Buffalo, New York. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 55(3), 390–424.
57.
WilcoxP.CullenF. T. (2018). Situational opportunity theories of crime. Annual Review of Criminology, 1, 123–148.
58.
WoJ. C. (2023). Crime generators or social capital organizations? Examining the effects of places of worship on neighborhood crime. PLoS one, 18(3), e0282196.
59.
WrightR.DeckerS. (1994). Burglars on the job: Streetlife and residential break-ins. Boston: Northeastern University Press.
