deterring and disrupting terrorism

situational crime prevention measures to prevent terrorist attacks against soft targets and crowded places: an evidence and gap map

this egm has three main objectives: (1) identify the strength (in terms of evidence quality) and depth (in terms of volume of evidence) of evidence base on the efficacy of situational crime prevention measures in preventing terrorist attacks against soft targets and crowded places. (2) identify the heterogeneity in the effects of situational crime prevention measures against terrorist attacks and link this to issues related to context and implementation. (3) identify the mechanisms through which situational crime prevention measures have an effect on terrorist attacks. 

a comparison of project servator and routine stop and search outcomes in the city of london

project servator is a strategic method of policing designed to deter, detect and disrupt a wide range of criminal activity including terrorism. this paper is the first empirical study to evaluate the stop and search aspect of servator deployments. we compare the outcomes of 3488 routine stop and searches and 510 servator stop and searches to determine whether the stop and search tactics used in this initiative produce more positive outcomes than routine stop and searches. we also compare outcomes of stop and searches that occurred on the basis of suspicious behaviour alone, by ethnicity, and through using a geographically matched sample. collectively, the results indicate that stop and searches that occur during servator deployments are more efficient than routine stop and search.

how robust is the evidence base for the human ability to recognise suspicious activity/hostile reconnaissance?

individuals differ in cognitive and perceptual skills and therefore infer different meanings from viewed behaviour. these differences in the interpretation of cues may affect the ability to accurately detect suspicious behaviour. observers of the environment need knowledge of behaviours linked to hostile intent, however establishing non-verbal indicators of hostile intent that are accurate across many contexts is difficult. cues of intent may not be expressed in cases where the crime is expressive or spontaneous. where they are apparent, they may be difficult to interpret accurately due to the observer’s absence of the perpetrators baseline ‘normal’ behaviour with which to compare. as these behaviours may deviate from situationally appropriate conduct observers also need knowledge of ‘normal’ behaviour for that specific location.