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Question - Police response times

D

Doug Huffman

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FogRider wrote:
Does anyone have any data on average police response times? I have consulted Google, but with limited success.
Click to expand...
G00gle's hit number one. Too bad the formatting was destroyed but an examination of the original .pdf shows the most frequent response time for both crimes of violence and property crime (separately tabulated) as "11 minutes to an hour."

How is this table, G00gle hit number one, a "limited success"?

http://www.google.com/search?q=police+response+times

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/cvus/current/cv05107.pdf

Table 107. Personal and property crimes, 2005: Download spreadsheet version
Percent distribution of incidents where police came to the victim,
by police response time and type of crime
Percent of incidents
Longer Length of
Within 5 6-10 11 minutes- Within than 1 time not Not
Type of crime Total minutes minutes 1 hour 1 day day known ascertained
Crimes of violence/a 100.0 % 28.9 % 27.9 % 34.0 % 3.8 % 1.9 %* 3.4 % 0.2 %*
Robbery 100.0 29.4 24.0 31.2 4.0 * 5.0 * 5.2 * 1.2 *
Aggravated assault 100.0 30.5 29.7 34.8 3.5 * 0.0 * 1.6 * 0.0 *
Simple assault 100.0 26.9 29.0 34.8 3.7 * 1.7 * 3.9 * 0.0 *
Property crimes 100.0 % 10.0 % 18.2 % 48.7 % 15.0 % 1.6 % 6.3 % 0.1 %*
Household burglary 100.0 8.5 20.9 51.7 12.5 0.8 * 5.6 0.0 *
Motor vehicle theft 100.0 7.9 21.7 43.7 19.6 0.5 * 6.1 * 0.6 *
Theft 100.0 11.3 15.9 48.0 15.5 2.3 6.8 0.1 *
Note: Detail may not add to total shown because of rounding.
*Estimate is based on about 10 or fewer sample cases.
a/Crimes of violence includes data on rape and sexual assault, not shown separately
 
F

FogRider

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Doug, I did see that one but it didn't really have all the information I was looking for. Like where and how those numbers were obtained, for instance. Also, it is from 2005, and I was hoping for something more recent.
 
B

bohdi

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I'll provide you what I've learned. Luckily Fairfax County VA has a pretty well kept and funded operation. As in your example (I've found this data other ways as well) I entered the following into Google.com:

police response time fairfax va

and this was the first item found 2001 Crime and Police Activity Statistics,

from this website http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/police/2001.htm

The website shows your relation in the web folder structure

homepage > public safety > police department > crime information > statistics > 2001

So then I hit the statistics link which shows the stats for 1997 - 2006.

When I hit the 2006 link, and it further breaks the stats into categories. I hit the one for Avg response time, by shift, by station, all priorities - which turns out to be 26.3 minutes - but that includes the total length of thetime lapsed from receipt of call to arrival on scene. Thinking that can't possibly be right I went backa page to the 2006 break out, and selected Avg response time, by shift, station, andPriority 1.

Things were better, Sully PD which covers where I'm at is a mere 7 minutes - andPriority 1 isconsidered a life threatening event that is ocourring or has ocurred.This includes the total length of thetime lapsed from receipt of call to arrival on scene. Lucky for those of us that attend the VCDL meetings in Mason District, we can see they are a bit quicker to respond at 4.9, but history has shown that they respond to man with gun calls pretty quick too at the super secret meet up place, lol. Those boys are on IT :D

Your results will vary getting this information PD to PD depending on $$$$ to collect, analyze, and support a website - if I were a betting man that would be my answer. Try that route in your search, and if you can't find it call the county executive and ask them. Let them know you care.
 
U

UTOC-45-44

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FogRider wrote:
Does anyone have any data on average police response times? I have consulted Google, but with limited success.
Click to expand...

The officers that I have talked to, agrees the that NATIONAL average is about 5-7 minutes.

TJ
 
U

UTOC-45-44

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jaredbelch wrote:
imperialism2024 wrote:
I'd think it would depend on the area more than anything. Though I do recall seeing some estimates on a thread around here from not too long ago... maybe 2 weeks at most.
Click to expand...
Dang that's a slow response time!!!!! :lol:
Click to expand...

Come on !!! To get away from that donut break IS VERY HARD:lol:

TJ
 
deepdiver

deepdiver

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As I said when we last discussed this, I think average police response times are useless unless you are looking at specific areas or comparing comparable areas.

In a county that may have a <2 minutes response inside it's cities, may have up to hours response time out in the county. National averages are essentially useless information unless broken down by some meaningful factor such as population density. As you didn't say what you are using this data for this may not apply to the OP, but just throwing it out there for whomever may care.
 
F

FogRider

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deepdiver wrote:
As I said when we last discussed this, I think average police response times are useless unless you are looking at specific areas or comparing comparable areas.

In a county that may have a <2 minutes response inside it's cities, may have up to hours response time out in the county. National averages are essentially useless information unless broken down by some meaningful factor such as population density. As you didn't say what you are using this data for this may not apply to the OP, but just throwing it out there for whomever may care.
Click to expand...

I know I need the stats broken down into smaller areas to be meaningfull, but I was hoping to find a single source that has various locales.
 
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