Overview

Whereas there is a vast literature on the descriptive side of criminality and criminology, the use of mathematical models and methods is still at its dawn, with the exception of two areas: (a) statistical analysis of data, and (b) image analysis for fingerprint identification, crime scene reconstruction and other forensic applications. Since the NETIAM workshop was intended to break completely new ground, these areas were not pursued further. However, for completeness we do offer some brief additional information here.

Statistical analysis

An international conference entitled Una societą pił sicura - A more secure society - was held in Rome, 3-5 December 2003, to coincide with the Italian semester of Presidency of EU. The presentations at this conference were organized into the following sessions:

• Victims of crime: differences in risks
• Trend of crimes in large cities
• Citizens and fear of crime
• Methodological problems in the comparison
• Crime prevention

Some of the papers presented at this conference take statistical approaches to questions that are close to the objectives of the NETIAM workshop:

• M. Barbagli (Bologna), Criminal victimization in Italy: trends and patterns in risks
• A. Blumstein (Carnegie Mellon) The recent rise and fall of crime in American cities
• A. Colombo (Bologna), Crimes in Italy: space and time variations
• Y. Gilinskiy (St. Petersburg) Situation and tendency of crime in Russian Metropolises
• H. von Hofer (Stockholm), Crime and punishment in Scandinavia
• T. Hope (Keele), Security from crime in risk society
• M. Killias (Lausanne), Criminality in Switzerland
• G. Lafree (Maryland), International police and health statistics on homicide
• P. Langan (US Dept of Justice), The remarkable drop in crime in New York City
• K. Sessar (Hamburg), Fear of crime as part of modern anxieties
• J. Lauritsen (St. Louis), Criminal victimization in the US: trends and patterns in risks
• L. Tournyol du Clos (Paris), Delinquency in Paris
• M. Strauss (New Hampshire), Prevalence of violence against dating partners by university students worldwide

Image analysis

A workshop on Crime scene reconstruction and computer image analysis was held in Manchester on 16 October 2002, bringing together university and company scientists and members of the police service. Participation was mainly from the UK and the topics covered were:

• Advanced interfaces in scenes of crime reconstruction
• 3D image capture, interpretation and applications
• Current practice in image use in criminal investigations
• Child victim identification
• Graphic image analysis by attribute categorisation
• Software tools for image filtering

These headings illustrate the different ways in which image analysis and crime come together. From one perspective, there is a need to detect crimes connected with the illegal storage or transmission of images such as child pornography or confidential corporate designs. These tasks require tools for image filtering, which can assess the extent to which two images are similar (even when they are in different formats). It is also valuable to be able to detect objects and people in the backgrounds of images. From a different viewpoint, image analysis is a tool that contributes to the detection of a much wider range of crime, through CCTV images, or to the successful prosecution of criminals, through crime scene reconstruction. It is now becoming possible to take still photographs of a crime scene and then construct a virtual reality environment of sufficient quality to be used as evidence in court.