Intelligence-Led Policing

Definition

Intelligence-led policing was originally articulated as a law enforcement operational strategy that sought to reduce crime through the combined use of crime analysis and criminal intelligence in order to determine crime reduction tactics that concentrate on the enforcement and prevention of criminal offender activity, with a focus on active and recidivist offenders. This approach emphasizes information gathering through the extensive use of confidential informants, [Page 177]offender interviews, analysis of recorded crime and calls for service, surveillance of suspects, and community sources of information. These sources are analyzed so that law enforcement managers can determine objective policing tactics in regard to enforcement targets, prevention activities and further intelligence gathering operations. In the last few years, the interpretation of ‘intelligence-led policing’ appears to be broadening in scope. While still retaining the central notion that police should avoid getting bogged down in reactive, individual, case investigations, intelligence-led policing is evolving into a management philosophy that places greater emphasis on information-sharing and collaborative, strategic solutions to crime problems at the local and regional level.

Distinctive Features

Originating in the UK, the intelligence-led policing paradigm has its foundations in the recognition that police were spending too much time responding to crime and too little time targeting offenders. Reports by the Audit Commission in 1993 and Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary in 1997 advocated increased use of intelligence, surveillance and informants to target recidivist offenders so that police could be more effective in fighting crime, and the call was quickly taken up by some police forces, most noticeably Kent Constabulary. Since then, the use of the term has extended to many countries, including Australia, New Zealand, continental Europe, and since 11 September, 2001, it has become increasingly common in the US.

Intelligence-led policing is philosophically closest to problem-oriented policing, and to a degree the accountability mechanism of Compstat, yet is distinct from both of these in different ways. Problem-oriented policing emphasizes the tackling of underlying problems that cause crime, problems that are identified and deciphered through effective crime analysis. Intelligence-led policing similarly defines a strong role for analysis, establishing it as the basis for decision-making that follows. However, where problem-oriented policing is a bottom-up philosophy that places street level police officers at the forefront of problem identification and resolution, existing implementations of intelligence-led policing are more hierarchical and emphasize the top-down, rank-oriented nature of law enforcement. Criminal intelligence flows up to decision-makers at the executive level, who set priorities for enforcement and prevention and pass these down to lower levels of the organization as operational taskings.

The hierarchical nature of the intelligence flow is, organizationally at least, similar to Compstat. Compstat also has a top-down operational structure, where senior managers hold lower ranks accountable for crime levels. Intelligence-led policing however has a more holistic view of the analysis of the criminal environment, in that it aims to include information from a wider and richer range of sources in order to better understand the context of the crime patterns often seen in Compstat meetings. Intelligence-led policing also attempts to seek longer-lasting solutions to complex local and organized crime problems, and to be future oriented and strategically focused.

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