The Effects of Civil Gang Injunctions on Reported Violent Crime: Evidence from Los Angeles County

Several cities have recently adopted civil injunctions as a means to reduce gang violence. To evaluate the effectiveness of such injunctions, I develop an extensive database of neighborhood‐level reported crime counts from four police jurisdictions within Los Angeles County. I construct two differen...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of law & economics 2002-04, Vol.45 (1), p.69-90
Main Author: Grogger, Jeffrey
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Crime patterns
Crime reporting
Defendants
Drug related crimes
Gangs
Injunctions
Police
Prosecuting attorneys
Rape
Violent crimes
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Summary:Several cities have recently adopted civil injunctions as a means to reduce gang violence. To evaluate the effectiveness of such injunctions, I develop an extensive database of neighborhood‐level reported crime counts from four police jurisdictions within Los Angeles County. I construct two different comparison samples of neighborhoods not covered by injunctions to control for underlying trends that could cause one to overstate the injunctions' effects. The analysis indicates that, in the first year after the injunctions are imposed, they lead the level of violent crime to decrease by 5–10 percent.
ISSN:0022-2186
1537-5285
DOI:10.1086/338348