The Riley County Police Department (RCPD) in Manhattan, Kansas, has employed geospatial crime reduction strategies on a macro level since 2010, concentrating high-visibility police activity in neighborhood-sized areas. In late 2012, the RCPD decided to refine its strategy to incorporate the latest research regarding hot spot policing at micro places—street segments no more than a city block in length. A recent experimental study by the Sacramento, California, Police Department suggested that police presence in high-crime micro places for short periods of time (12–15 minutes) results in reduced crime and calls for service.1 The RCPD developed a similar strategy for Manhattan (population 53,000), named Initiative: Laser Point, and enlisted the assistance of a research team from Kansas State University to evaluate the strategy’s effectiveness from two perspectives. First, the existing literature has not addressed whether hot spot policing works in non-urban areas like Manhattan. Second, and more importantly, little has been done to assess behavioral practices of police officers within the hot spots. The RCPD study seeks to provide practical and experimental insight to these two issues.
