Justin Nix’s research while affiliated with University of Nebraska at Omaha and other places

What is this page?


This page lists works of an author who doesn't have a ResearchGate profile or hasn't added the works to their profile yet. It is automatically generated from public (personal) data to further our legitimate goal of comprehensive and accurate scientific recordkeeping. If you are this author and want this page removed, please let us know.

Publications (96)


ViCAP usage and viability for sexual assault investigations: findings from a survey of SAKI sites
  • Article

October 2024

·

4 Reads

Police Practice and Research

Michaela E. Benson-Goldsmith

·

Brad Campbell

·

·

Justin Nix

Elevated Police Turnover Following the Summer of George Floyd Protests
  • Article
  • Full-text available

September 2024

·

10 Reads

Police resignations increased by 279% following the George Floyd protests, posing significant challenges for police staffing and operational capacity. Retirements and involuntary separations (e.g., terminations due to misconduct) did not show significant changes, but the elevated resignations are likely to continue. Effective strategies to improve organizational justice (i.e., perceptions of fair treatment of individuals within an organization) and support for officers are crucial to addressing the retention crisis. Follow-up studies support the idea of a policing workforce crisis and its negative effect on agencies’ abilities to serve communities.

Download



Figure 2
Year Average Daily Staffing Average Daily Call Count Average Proactive Call Count
Staffing Levels are the Most Important Factor Influencing Police Response Times

February 2024

·

73 Reads

·

1 Citation


Staffing levels are the most important factor influencing police response times

February 2024

·

136 Reads

·

5 Citations

Policing

We examine the factors influencing police response times, with a particular focus on staffing levels, calls for service (CFS), and proactive police work. We estimate Bayesian Holt-Winters state-space models for each CFS priority level. Using a novel dataset that combines data from the Salt Lake City Police Department's staffing and Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) systems at the daily level over seven years, we estimate the effects that staffing, overtime, call volume, and the level of proactive work (e.g., traffic stops, pedestrian stops, business checks) have on police response times. Our findings indicate that the impact of staffing on response times is significantly greater than that of other independent variables in the models. Furthermore, improvements in response times for higher-priority (i.e., more serious) CFS have a lower elasticity response to increases in staffing levels. As police agencies face increasingly complex challenges, the empirical evidence presented herein serves as a cornerstone for making informed decisions in the intricate balancing act of resources, officer well-being, and public safety priorities.



When police pull back: Neighborhood‐level effects of de‐policing on violent and property crime

February 2024

·

642 Reads

·

14 Citations

Criminology

Many U.S. cities witnessed both de‐policing and increased crime in 2020, yet whether the former contributed to the latter remains unclear. Indeed, much of what is known about the effects of proactive policing on crime comes from studies that evaluated highly focused interventions atypical of day‐to‐day policing, used cities as the unit of analysis, or could not rule out endogeneity. This study addresses each of these issues, thereby advancing the evidence base concerning the effects of policing on crime. Leveraging two exogenous shocks presented by the onset of the coronavirus 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic and social unrest after the murder of George Floyd, we evaluated the effects of sudden and sustained reductions in high‐discretion policing on crime at the neighborhood level in Denver, Colorado. Multilevel models accounting for trends in prior police activity, neighborhood structure, seasonality, and population mobility revealed mixed results. On the one hand, large‐scale reductions in stops and drug‐related arrests were associated with significant increases in violent and property crimes, respectively. On the other hand, fewer disorder arrests did not affect crime. These results were not universal across neighborhoods. We discuss the implications of these findings in light of debates concerning the appropriate role of policing in the 21st century.



Police Shootings in Canada: An Empirical Analysis and Call for Data

February 2024

·

4 Reads

Crime & Delinquency

We analyzed police shootings in Canada (except Québec) between 2017 and 2019. Drawing upon media reports and information provided by police oversight agencies, we attempted to identify all incidents where on-duty police officers discharged their firearm with the intent to strike a person. Findings indicated that such incidents occurred an average of 58 times per year. Approximately 39% of police shootings were fatal, 48% were non-fatal, and 12% were non-injurious. Most occurred in public spaces and were initiated by civilian requests for police service, typically for crime-related reasons. We discuss our findings with respect to both research and practice. We also call for official, incident-level data regarding police shootings to address concerns that otherwise exist about these incidents among civilians, practitioners, researchers, and policymakers.


Citations (63)


... Research has shown that the number of officers available at the time of dispatch significantly affects response times, especially for lower-priority calls. A study focusing on police staffing levels found that response times for priority calls can increase when staffing shortages occur, highlighting that maintaining adequate staffing is crucial for minimizing delays (Mourtgos et al., 2024). ...

Reference:

POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY BOARD REGULAR MEETING SUPPLEMENTAL AGENDA PACKET
Staffing Levels are the Most Important Factor Influencing Police Response Times

... The current landscape of police staffing is shaped by a multitude of factors that require a comprehensive and adaptive approach. Recent societal events have profoundly impacted police personnel dynamics (Adams et al., 2023;Mourtgos et al., 2021Mourtgos et al., , 2024Mourtgos and Adams, 2023), underscoring the need for strategies that not only address immediate staffing shortages but also anticipate long-term challenges (Wilson and Heinonen, 2012). ...

Staffing levels are the most important factor influencing police response times

Policing

... Some evidence supports these claims, particularly when discretionary traffic stops are executed in high-crime hot spots (Braga et al., 2019). Although the effect of traffic stops across larger geographic areas may not find as much support as micro-locations (although see Petersen and colleagues (2023), there is a body of literature showing an impact of discretionary traffic stops on crime (Boehme & Mourtgos, 2024;Nix et al., 2024). Moreover, police argue that these stops are necessary for executing daily duties and maintaining low crime rates (Epp et al., 2014;Lee, 2022). ...

When police pull back: Neighborhood-level effects of de-policing on violent and property crime, a research note

... The employment of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in mapping crime incidents and conducting hotspot analysis by several researchers (e.g., Han et al., 2023;Mokhtar et al., 2023) has yielded valuable insights into crime patterns, shaping future research methodologies. Additionally, studies by Nix et al. (2024) and Santos (2021) underscore the significance of proactive policing on neighborhood-level crime rates, emphasizing the necessity for understanding its impacts across various crime types, including property crimes, to craft evidence-based policies (Jubit et al., 2020;Tavares & Costa, 2021). ...

When police pull back: Neighborhood‐level effects of de‐policing on violent and property crime

Criminology

... This includes an increased reliance on police services to undertake other duties that put them in contact with individuals with mental illness and cognitive impairments, including wellness checks, addressing citizen concerns about observed behaviours, and the provision of care and case management for those whom they frequently encounter . While the number of encounters that result in police taking formal legal action (e.g., arrest and apprehension) or using lethal or less-than-lethal force accounts for a small proportion of police encounters (Simpson & Nix, 2024;, highly publicised incidents in which police misconstrue the behaviours of individuals with mental illness and cognitive impairments as a source of threat or danger have contributed to heightened public scrutiny about what police services are doing to prepare their officers to interact with these individuals. This public scrutiny includes increased interest and concern from the autism community, scholars, and police services about how to ensure the safety of autistic individuals during encounters and what interventions (e.g., training or registries) are needed to prepare officers for these encounters. ...

Police Shootings in Canada: An Empirical Analysis and Call for Data

Crime & Delinquency

... 14 within respondents classified as black or as white (Pickett et al., 2024). Some racialized contexts show both large between-race disagreements and agreements, where ratings of the role of race in the shooting of Michael Brown exhibited 46.8% overlap between black and white distributions (Jefferson et al., 2020). ...

Officer diversity may reduce Black Americans’ fear of the police
  • Citing Article
  • December 2023

Criminology

... Previous incidents, such as the killings of Michael Brown in Ferguson and Eric Garner in New York, sparked major protests, and tensions had been building in the months leading up to the 2020 protests. Thus, one could argue that the protests were not only foreseeable but had already begun before the larger wave (Adams et al., 2023;Tucker, 2021). However, the events that unfolded were volatile. ...

Turnover in large US policing agencies following the George Floyd protests
  • Citing Article
  • September 2023

Journal of Criminal Justice

... These findings further underscore the need for evidence-based institutional reforms to eliminate officerinvolved killings in the Black community and other manifestations of biased policing. [78][79][80] For example, available evidence, though still sparse or mixed for many interventions (eg, body-worn cameras or de-escalation training [80][81][82], suggests that increasing accountability for officers, 83 implementing training to reduce officer decision-making biases in stressful encounters, 84 increasing police force diversity, 19,85 and encouraging citizen activism 86 may be effective in reducing officer use of force. Ongoing municipal experiments with alternate approaches to policing (eg, embedded behavioral health expertise 87 or social work 69 ) may yield further data on effective approaches. ...

Officer Diversity May Reduce Black Americans’ Fear of the Police
  • Citing Preprint
  • August 2022

... Third, agencies may capitalize on word-of-mouth recruiting from veterans who are already employed, thus ensuring a smoother transition. As both corrections and policing agencies continue to raise concerns about a crisis in recruitment and turnover (Adams et al., 2023;Vickovic et al., 2022), there is increasing effort among agencies to leverage "lateral transfers"-recruiting already-employed officers from other agencies-and network effects among officers with military experience may prove valuable to agencies seeking to increase their sworn numbers. Fourth, as mentioned, prior service may count toward time served in an institution and employee pensions. ...

Turnover in Large US Police Agencies Following the George Floyd Protests
  • Citing Preprint
  • March 2023

... After constructing a BSTS model, one can estimate a probabilistic forecast starting at an intervention point, comparing that counterfactual to the actual observed values post-intervention. This method has been employed in studies examining the effects of George Floyd's murder on police turnover , shifts in victim service demand during the pandemic (Richards et al., 2021), and changes in gun assaults against police post-George Floyd's murder (Sierra-Arévalo et al., 2023). ...

The “war on cops,” retaliatory violence, and the murder of George Floyd *
  • Citing Article
  • April 2023

Criminology