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Crime Reduction and the Law This innovative and pioneering new book explains the multifaceted links between crime reduction and the law and how current British legislation works to improve or hinder crime reduction. Providing a detailed and sustained analysis, Crime Reduction and the Law offers a thorough guide to many of the most contemporary and pressing concerns in the field of crime reduction. It considers social policy, politics and the legislation that surrounds and drives the crime reduction agenda and how specific legislation and the setting of performance targets aids or undermines attempts at crime reduction. This includes consideration of the creation of ‘safe environments’ through town and country planning legislation, the role of local authorities in crime reduction initiatives, the effectiveness of police performance targets, the concept of crime as pollution, the role of the national offender management service, paedophilia legislation and programmes to control crime committed by the mentally disordered. Bringing together the work of internationally renowned experts in this field, this book will be highly useful to students of criminology and sociology, as well as crime prevention and reduction practitioners, police officers and community safety partnership professionals. Kate Moss is Lecturer in Criminology at Loughborough University. Her research specialisms are crime prevention and community safety and she has recently undertaken work for the Home Office on information sharing to reduce crime and also the development of a risk index for domestic burglary. Mike Stephens is Senior Lecturer in Criminology and Social Policy at Loughborough University. He has specialised in policing and criminal justice matters for a number of years and he has published widely in these fields. Recently, he has been interested in the role of the police in the handling of those with acute mental health problems. Crime Reduction and the Law Edited by Kate Moss and Mike Stephens First published 2006 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group © 2006 Edited by Kate Moss and Mike Stephens This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2006. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Crime reduction and the law / edited by Kate Moss and Mike Stephens.-- 1st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-415-35144-8 (pbk.) -- ISBN 0-415-35143-X (hard cover) 1. Crime--Government policy--Great Britain. 2. Crime prevention-Great Britain. 3. Criminal law--Great Britain. I. Moss, Kate. II. Stephens, Mike. HV6947.C734 2006 364.4--dc22 2005011246 ISBN10: 0–415–35144–8 ISBN13: 978-0-415-35144-7 (pbk) ISBN10: 0–415–35143-X ISBN13: 978-0-415-35143-0 (hbk) Taylor & Francis Group is the Academic Division of T&F Informa plc. For my parents, Graham and Pauline, and my children, Gemma and Christopher. For my brother and very good friend, Mark, who gave me his only rugby ticket for the Millennium Stadium where Wales beat Ireland for the Grand Slam. ‘Greater love hath no man ….’ Contents Notes on contributors Preface<