Mapping

Mapping of crime locations is important to plan effective interventions based on the best possible knowledge. Multi-agency mapping can add even more detail and enable operations based on shared knowledge.

There are a variety of software programmes in general use for the mapping of crime generally and any of these is appropriate to the mapping of drug related crime. However, as the data for drug related crime are accumulated from many sources, it is important that the programme can cope with and can apply the right kind of data “cleaning” to ensure that it can be mapped alongside police data for the purposes of identifying hotspots. Guidance on this can be found in the Home Office publication Data Exchange and Crime mapping http://www.crimereduction.gov.uk/technology01.pdf

This publication details the issues to do with data protection and rules about disclosure that need to be applied before data sets can be shared. When such a programme is in use, it enables data from many sources to be mapped against each other, ironing out problems of location, pinpointing and coding. Inevitably, to ensure that this composite data mapping is achieved, a minimum area definition for mapping purposes should be agreed. This should be small enough and localised enough to give enough identification of area for operational and intervention purposes.