Policing, Justice, and Security in a Diverse Canada: Building an Empirical Evidence Base

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Policing, Justice, and Security in a Diverse
CanadaBuilding an Empirical Evidence Base

• Lunch Presentation
• Ramiro Martinez, Jr.
• Professor of Criminal Justice
• Florida International University
• Miami, Florida
• martinra_at_fiu.edu
• 02/25/2008

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Impetus for conference and book

• The primary goal of the NCOVR conference and this
  book was to assemble a diverse group of scholars
  who would offer new and innovative approaches to
  the study of ethnicity, immigration status, and
  crime, or the impact of immigration on violent
  events and crime.
• Taken together they all extend this area of
  knowledge and offer guidance on much-needed
  future research efforts in this area of social
  inquiry.

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Impetus for conference and book-2

• They also remind us that criminologists can no
  longer restrict studies of crime to Whites and
  Blacks.
• At the same time immigration researchers can no
  longer ignore the study of violence or crime.
• U.S. is increasingly multi-ethnic and immigrant
  communities are proliferating.
• The time has come to ask and answer more
  questions about immigration and crime than have
  been traditionally posed.

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Guide Future Research

• Stereotypes surrounding this issue also need to
  be examined in light of empirical studies.
• Most importantly, this book will hopefully guide
  much needed future scholarly activity in this
  important area of research.

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Recommendations

• Define immigration and crime and ask the
  contributors to follow those definitions.
• Ask contributors to the degree possible, they
  cover the extent of immigrant criminal activity
  or immigrant victimization.
• The latter topic - the criminal victimization of
  immigrants is an overlooked theme in the social
  science literature and certainly not an issue
  central to the public debate on crime. Focus is
  on offending.

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More recommendations

• Yet victimization among this group is an
  important social problem to explore since, on the
  one hand it encompasses crime in the U.S., and on
  the other it helps form the immigrants
  perception of the criminal justice system.
• Over time, it also shapes the nature and extent
  of the immigrant experience with other
  racial\ethnic group members, and co-ethnics, in
  new communities as they are incorporated into
  society.

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Place the literature in context

• I highlight current stereotypes about immigrant
  criminality, and then provide a brief overview of
  early theoretical and empirical work on the
  immigration and crime relationship.
• I then focus on more contemporary work in this
  area. In the last section, I address the many
  contributions the current volume makes to the
  nascent immigration and crime literature.

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Persistent data problems

• Most do not examine Haitians, Asian sub-groups
  (Vietnamese, Chinese, Filipino) or Mexican
  border-crossers.
• Even fewer examine nationality so need for
  additional studies on the topic
• The persistent problem of examining violence
  among immigrants were addressed in innovative
  ways by the contributors.
• Yet relying on official data limits research in
  this area.

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Immigration and violence Over time

• Immigrants currently comprise a larger portion of
  the U.S. population since the early 1900s.
• One of the most profound and recent demographic
  transformations across the nation.
• Immigrants currently number over 33 million (not
  counting an almost equal number of U.S. born
  children of immigrants) and now comprise almost
  12 of the U.S. population.
• This percentage falls short of those 100 years
  ago (about one-third of the population was
  immigrant or children of immigrants in 1910), but
  this figure could grow rapidly.

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Immigration and violence Over time

• To be sure, it is not clear that the increasing
  proportion of new immigrants across time is
  directly linked to the annual rates of violent
  crime.
• What is clear is that the annual percentage of
  immigrants has more than doubled since 1980 and
  it has risen at the same time as rates of
  homicide (per 100,000) and robbery (per 1,000)
  have both risen sharply and then plummeted.
  Start by drawing a figure of this type.

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Immigration and Violence Spatial

• Also, it is not clear that the increasing
  proportion of new immigrants across cities and
  communities is directly linked to the annual
  rates of violent crime.
• What is also clear is that communities where
  immigrants reside and where they dominate are not
  always place where homicide are concentrated.
  Next step is drawing a map of this type.

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Census tracts with High Latino Population
Incident geocoded according to incident address
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Popular topic

• Contemporary immigration into the United States
  is a topic generating media attention and
  political reactions across the nation.
• Many immigrants are stereotyped by some as
  violent criminals and dangerous threats to
  society intending to wreak havoc in our
  communities.
• This book tells a very different story than what
  we see and hear on cable news shows, political
  blogs and rhetoric on the floor of Congress.
  Immigration and Crime makes an important
  contribution to the study of immigrant
  participation in crime and the impact of
  immigration into urban communities.

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Debunks stereotypes

• The contributors debunk the criminal immigrant
  stereotype with solid quantitative and
  qualitative analysis while avoiding misleading
  impressions and misinformed anecdotes that fuel
  the singling out of immigrants in twenty-first
  century America.
• The book challenges public opinion and policy
  concerning immigrant violence and portrays the
  strength of immigrants and immigrant communities.

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Cant cover everything

• The chapters in this book do not cover everything
  about immigration and violence but they do help
  us understand the importance of studying the
  topic.
• All of the authors are aware of the deep-rooted
  problems in this research area and have sought to
  overcome them in many ways.
• The authors have many voices, differences in
  perspectives, interpretations, findings, and of
  course conclusions. Nevertheless, taken together
  the respective chapters should prompt much
  additional research.

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What is next?

• U.S. is not Canada.
• Few Tortilla Curtains on the northern border to
  keep people in upstate New York.
• Other areas need research but be broad.
• Studying deportees?
• Singling out immigrants for victimization.
• (Hate Crimes)?
• Gender differences important to examine.
• (Trafficking, Human Smuggling?).
• Absorption of youths into society.
• (Not just gangs).

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Conclusion

• Overall, researchers usually argue that fears of
  immigrant crime are largely unfounded, as
  immigrants are themselves often the victims of
  discrimination, stigmatization, and crime.
• Will this hold in Canada?