U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government, Department of Justice.

NCJRS Virtual Library

The Virtual Library houses over 235,000 criminal justice resources, including all known OJP works.
Click here to search the NCJRS Virtual Library

Sooner the Better - Some Effects of Police Response Time (From Police at Work, P 145-164, 1983, Richard R Bennett, ed. - See NCJ-89673)

NCJ Number
89680
Author(s)
G W Cordner; J R Greene; T S Bynum
Date Published
1983
Length
20 pages
Annotation
The capacity of the police to reach the crime scene soon after the actual occurrence is very limited because of citizen delays in reporting crime. Consequently, relationships between police response time and desired case outcomes are weak.
Abstract
Recent research has questioned the presumed advantages of reducing police response time by discovering that citizens rarely notify the police immediately on discovering crimes or other emergencies. This study used 2 sets of data from the Pontiac Police Department (Michigan): monthly data from January 1975 to September 1979 and information on 1,688 incidents occurring during 5 sample weeks between July 1978 and July 1979. Analysis of the 57-month period produced moderate support for the traditional conclusion that quicker response times result in more onscene arrests. The study of the 5-week period focused on the interval between the time occurred and time reported for each incident. The median overall time interval or true response time was 201.5 minutes, while report to dispatch was 2.5 minutes, dispatch to arrival was 9.0 minutes, and arrival to call completion was 37.7 minutes. The median true response time was 37.5 minutes for robbery, 42 minutes for assault, 5.5 hours for burglary, and 8 hours for larceny. While shorter response times were associated with better outcomes, the true response time was actually very lengthy because of citizen delays in reporting, an element outside police control. Thus, police need to identify calls that are hot or at least still warm for immediate response, educate the community about reporting crimes, and possibly institute directed patrols to detect crimes in progress. Tables and 19 references are provided.