Spatial analyses of crime

The new century brings with it growing interest in crime places. This interest spans theory from the perspective of understanding the etiol-ogy of crime, and practice from the perspective of developing effec-tive criminal justice interventions to reduce crime. We do not attempt a comprehensive treatment of the substantial body of theoretical and empirical research on place and crime but focus instead on method-ological issues in spatial statistical analyses of crime data. Special attention is given to some practical and accessible methods of exploratory data analysis that arguably should be the starting place of any empirical analyses of the relationship of place to crime. Many of the capabilities to support computerized mapping and spatial statisti-cal analyses emerged only recently during the 1990s. The promise of using spatial data and analyses for crime control still remains to be demonstrated and depends on the nature of the relationship between crime and place. If spatial features serve as actuating factors fo