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W.E.B. DuBois, in his 1903 collection of writings entitled The Souls of Black Folk, describes what he calls “The Veil,” which succinctly sums up the deadly and adverse experiences of African Americans in the US. With DuBois contemplations of a Veil under which US Blacks alone live and die as context, this paper takes a look at the modern condition of African Americans in the US, whether they continue to exist within DuBois Veil in modern times (twentieth and twenty-first centuries), and if so, to what extent. As a routine examination and inspection of the condition of Blacks in the US, focus is placed on black lives lost, beginning with an appraisal of their size in the US population overtime, and in comparison with other racial and ethnic groups in the US. US census data, health data collected from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and crime data collected from the Federal Bureau of Investigation are examined to construct a composite of the condition of contemporary Blacks in the US as compared to other groups in the US, focusing attention specifically on the rates at which their lives are lost compared to others through infant mortality, low fertility rates, abortion, and high rates of homicide. This analysis concludes with a look at death from homicide before, during, and after the post-1990s drop in the crime rate.

Crime linkage analysis (CLA) can be applied in the police investigation-phase to sift through a database to find behaviorally similar cases to the one under investigation and in the trial-phase to try to prove that the perpetrator of two or more offences is the same, by showing similarity and distinctiveness in the offences. Lately, research has moved toward more naturalistic settings, analyzing data sets that are as similar to actual crime databases as possible. One such step has been to include one-off offences in the data sets, but this has not yet been done with homicide. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how linking accuracy of serial homicide is affected as a function of added hard-to-solve one-off offences.

A sample (N = 117–1160) of Italian serial homicides (n = 116) and hard-to-solve one-off homicides (n = 1–1044, simulated from 45 cases) was analyzed using a Bayesian approach to identify series membership, and a case by case comparison of similarity using Jaccard’s coefficient. Linking accuracy was evaluated using receiver operating characteristics and by examining the sensitivity and specificity of the model.

After an initial dip in linking accuracy (as measured by the AUC), the accuracy increased as more one-offs were added to the data. While adding one-offs made it easier to identify correct series (increased sensitivity), there was an increase in false positives (decreased specificity) in the linkage decisions. When rank ordering cases according to similarity, linkage accuracy was affected negatively as a function of added non-serial cases.

While using a more natural data set, in terms of adding a significant portion of non-serial homicides into the mix, does introduce error into the linkage decision, the authors conclude that taken overall, the findings still support the validity of CLA in practice.

This is the first crime linkage study on homicide to investigate how linking accuracy is affected as a function of non-serial cases being introduced into the data.

Purpose – This chapter explains what is known about international homicide trends, highlights gaps in existing literature, and proposes avenues for future research that will expand understanding about international homicide.

Design/methodology/approach – We review extant literature on international homicide trends, and draw on data from the World Health Organization from 1990 to 2015 to identify patterns in contemporary international homicide trends.

Findings – We demonstrate evidence of an international homicide drop across most regions around the world. Nonetheless, the homicide decline is not a global event as several countries – particularly countries with high homicide rates – did not experience reductions in homicide during this period. The key question remains as to what the causes of changes in international homicide rates are and why many countries experience very similar reductions in homicide while a few experienced increasing violence. We propose potential explanations and suggest areas for future research.

Originality/value – This chapter documents an international homicide decline occurring between 1990 and 2015. We also demonstrate that homicide trends are likely influenced by factors beyond local phenomena and domestic policies since homicide rates largely track together for regions throughout the world. Accordingly, the chapter suggests potential avenues for future research that can help better explain this trend.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the differences (if any) between serial and hard-to-solve one-off homicides, and to determine if it is possible to distinguish the two types of homicides based on offence behaviours and victim characteristics.

A sample of 116 Italian serial homicides was compared to 45 hard-to-solve one-off homicides. Hard-to-solve one-off homicides were defined as having at least 72 hours pass between when the offence came to the knowledge of the police and when the offender was caught. Logistic regression was used to predict whether a killing was part of a series or a one-off offence.

The serial killers targeted more strangers and prostitutes, displayed a higher level of forensic awareness both before and after the killing, and had more often an apparent sexual element in their offence. Conversely, the one-off homicides were found to include more traits indicative of impulsive and expressive behaviour. The model demonstrated a good ability (AUC=0.88) to predict whether a homicide belonged to the serial or one-off category.

The findings should be replicated using local homicide data to maximise the validity of the model in countries outside of Italy.

Being able to distinguish between serial and one-off homicides based on information available at a new crime scene could be practically useful for homicide investigators managing finite resources.

Studies comparing serial homicides to one-off homicides are scarce, and there are no studies explicitly trying to predict whether a homicide is an isolated case or part of a series.

The purpose of this paper is to identify offender typologies based on aspects of the offenders’ psychopathology and their associations with crime scene behaviours using data derived from the National Confidential Enquiry into Suicide and Safety in Mental Health concerning homicides in England and Wales committed by offenders in contact with mental health services in the year preceding the offence (n=759).

The authors used multiple correspondence analysis to investigate the interrelationships between the variables and hierarchical agglomerative clustering to identify offender typologies. Variables describing: the offenders’ mental health histories; the offenders’ mental state at the time of offence; characteristics useful for police investigations; and patterns of crime scene behaviours were included.

Results showed differences in the offenders’ histories in relation to their crime scene behaviours. Further, analyses revealed three homicide typologies: externalising, psychosis and depression.

These typologies may assist the police during homicide investigations by: furthering their understanding of the crime or likely suspect; offering insights into crime patterns; provide advice as to what an offender’s offence behaviour might signify about his/her mental health background. Findings suggest information concerning offender psychopathology may be useful for offender profiling purposes in cases of homicide offenders with schizophrenia, depression and comorbid diagnosis of personality disorder and alcohol/drug dependence.

Empirical studies with an emphasis on offender profiling have almost exclusively focussed on the inference of offender demographic characteristics. This study provides a first step in the exploration of offender psychopathology and its integration to the multivariate analysis of offence information for the purposes of investigative profiling of homicide by identifying the dominant patterns of mental illness within homicidal behaviour.

Purpose – Cross-national comparisons of crime across the world consistently show that homicide rates are higher in more impoverished countries. However, there is a debate on what aspect of poverty is related to violence. Economics aspects have been conceived as wealth, poverty, and inequality. Furthermore, the impact of economic determinants has never been studied against a second potential determinant, which is the quality of the formal social control mechanisms.

Design/methodology/approach – In this study, we use official data made available by international agencies as well as new and original data from the World Homicide Survey, based on the responses provided by 1,223 respondents located in 145 countries of the world.

Findings – Results show that the two main determinants of the homicide rate are economic inequality (Gini) and the quality of the formal social control mechanisms. However, this second dimension is dependent on the wealth of the nation (gross domestic product) and the prevalence of poverty.

This study aims to use a novel data set of 636 murderers sentenced to death in California to investigate homicide offenses that are committed but not prosecuted or officially solved, a concept known as the dark figure of crime.

Uaing appellate records from the Supreme Court of California, which contain extensive information about the offender’s background, criminal offense history and mental health diagnoses, it was revealed that one-third of the offenders in the sample have additional homicide offenses for which they likely bear responsibility, but were not prosecuted.

Most of these involve one or two additional homicides, though a wide range was observed spanning 0 to 93 additional victims. Those with a dark figure of murder and unsolved homicides had substantially more prior arrests, convictions and prison incarcerations and were higher in psychopathy, sexual sadism, homicidal ideation and gang involvement than offenders without a dark figure. Psychopathy and homicidal ideation were the most robust predictors of both the presence and magnitude of a dark figure of murder and unsolved homicides, whereas sexual sadism was inconsistently associated.

A disproportionate amount of the unsolved murders in the USA are likely perpetrated by the most pathological types of offenders, those with extensive antisocial careers and severe externalizing psychopathology.

This paper applies novel techniques from the field of operations management to examine the allocation of patrol and investigative personnel to identify which is most effective in improving police performance around homicide clearance.

A panel sample of homicide clearance rates from the 100 largest US cities between 2000 and 2013 were analyzed in two steps: first, a random-effects regression model was performed to locate influential factors; second, optimum analysis was applied to locate the optimal values that yield maximal homicide clearance.

Both patrol and investigative personnel levels have a significant impact on homicide clearance. Maximal clearance can be achieved by allocating departmental personnel to investigative roles.

Given recent trends around “defunding” police and public sector austerity measures, future research should continue to explore the utility of optimum analysis for efficient allocation of policing personnel.

This study provides proof of concept for the use of optimum analysis in policing research.

In the context of social sustainability, characterization of sustainable development embroils a process of growth not only without social disruption but also without the involvement of any severe risk of environmental collapse of the ecosystem. Economic, social, and environmental aspects in an interactive setup determine the different dimensions of sustainability. In this backdrop, this chapter focuses on the dimensions of social sustainability of the development process – particularly with an eye on the determining factors of social tension resulting in social disruption which in turn become noticeable through violent forms of different types of crime – homicides (murder), property-related crimes (dacoity, robbery, burglary, and theft), and riots. Although the occurrences of such crimes in an indicator of weakness in the law and order of the state, one needs to evaluate the significant role played by various types of deprivation and discrimination. This study attempts to find out the role played by economic deprivation for the incidence of such crimes in the presence of infrastructural and socioeconomic developmental factors. This analysis is performed in the context of India using generalized method of moments (GMM) structure with panel data of 16 major Indian states from 2005 to 2016.

This paper addresses the clearance of aggravated assaults (AAs). Specifically, the authors consider variations in these clearances over time for large agencies and test which crime, investigation and agency factors are associated with the likelihood of clearance by arrest or exceptional means. In doing this work, they seek to extend the understanding of how police can improve their investigations and ability to solve serious offenses.

Using case, investigative and organizational data collected from seven large police departments selected on the basis of their trajectory of index crime clearances, and measures of case characteristics, investigative effort and organizational best practices, this paper uses descriptive and inferential statistics to analyze AA investigations and case clearance.

Key findings include the following: trajectories of AA clearance vary across large agencies and covary with a measure of organizational best practices, and the relationship between investigative effort and case clearance can depend on organizational practices. The authors find that measures of investigative effort are either not related to case clearance or there is a negative association.

Now that police researchers have a better understanding of AAs and their investigations, they need to test how this knowledge can be used to improve the quality of police investigations. Tests, preferably multi-agency randomized control trials, of new investigative strategies and organizational practices are needed.

This research is original in that it uses a multi-agency sample and crime, investigation and organizational measures to understand AA clearance.