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Description & Citation--Study No. 6134 | |
Bibliographic Description | |
| ICPSR Study No.: | 6134 |
|---|---|
| Persistent URL: | http://dx.doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR06134 |
| Title: | Improving the Investigation of Homicide and the Apprehension Rate of Murderers in Washington State, 1981-1986 |
| Principal Investigator(s): | Robert D. Keppel, Washington State Attorney General's Office |
| Joseph G. Weis, University of Washington, Center for Law and Justice | |
| Funding Agency: | United States Department of Justice. National Institute of Justice. |
| Grant Number: | 87-IJ-CX-0026 |
| Bibliographic Citation: | Keppel, Robert D., and Joseph G. Weis. IMPROVING THE INVESTIGATION OF HOMICIDE AND THE APPREHENSION RATE OF MURDERERS IN WASHINGTON STATE, 1981-1986 [Computer file]. Compiled by Robert D. Keppel, Washington State Attorney General's Office, and Joseph G. Weis, University of Washington, Center for Law and Justice. ICPSR ed. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [producer and distributor], 1993. doi:10.3886/ICPSR06134 |
Scope of Study | |
| Summary: | This data collection contains information on solved murders occurring in Washington State between 1981 and 1986. The collection is a subset of data from the Homicide Investigation Tracking System (HITS), a computerized database maintained by the state of Washington that contains information on murders and sexual assault cases in that state. The data for HITS are provided voluntarily by police and sheriffs' departments covering 273 jurisdictions, medical examiners' and coroners' offices in 39 counties, prosecuting attorneys' offices in 39 counties, the Washington State Department of Vital Statistics, and the Uniform Crime Report Unit of the Washington State Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. Collected data include crime evidence, victimology, offender characteristics, geographic locations, weapons, and vehicles. |
| Subject Term(s): | databases, demographic characteristics, evidence, homicide, murder, offender profiles, police departments, police records, sexual assault, vehicles, victims, weapons |
| Geographic Coverage: | United States, Washington |
| Time Period: | 1981 - 1986 |
| Date(s) of Collection: | 1981 - 1986 |
| Unit of Observation: | For Part 1: victims of murder, for Part 2: offenders, and for Part 3: incidents of murder. |
| Universe: | Murders occurring in Washington State from 1981 to 1986. |
| Data Type: | event/transaction data |
Methodology | |
| Purpose of the Study: | This data collection is constructed from the Homicide Investigation Tracking System (HITS), a computerized database maintained by the state of Washington. HITS was designed to (1) provide law enforcement officials with information regarding incidents of murder, (2) provide analysis of these incidents such as links between victims, offenders, and cases, and (3) provide investigators with resources, including names of experts and technical assistance in investigating such cases. |
| Study Design: | The HITS database consists of murder cases, both solved and unsolved, occurring in Washington State between 1981 and 1986. Incidents tracked include murders, attempted murders, missing persons when foul play is suspected, and unidentified persons believed to be victims of murder. The system relies on law enforcement agencies in Washington State to submit information voluntarily to HITS investigators. This data collection consists of information on solved murder cases only. |
| Sample: | Solved murder cases occurring between 1981 and 1986 from the state of Washington's HITS database. |
| Data Source: | official crime records |
| Description of Variables: | Collected data include crime evidence, victimology, offender characteristics, geographic locations, weapons, and vehicles. |
| Response Rates: | Not applicable. |
| Presence of Common Scales: | None |
Access and Availability | |
| Note: | A list of the data formats available for this study can be found in the summary of holdings. Detailed file-level information (such as record length, case count, and variable count) is listed in the file manifest. |
| Original ICPSR Release: | 1994-03-10 |
| Version History: | The last update of this study occurred on 2006-01-12. |
| 2006-01-12 - All files were removed from dataset 8 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads. | |
| 2006-01-12 - All files were removed from dataset 4 and flagged as study-level files, so that they will accompany all downloads. | |
| 2005-11-04 - On 2005-03-14 new files were added to one or more datasets. These files included additional setup files as well as one or more of the following: SAS program, SAS transport, SPSS portable, and Stata system files. The metadata record was revised 2005-11-04 to reflect these additions. | |
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