A task force was created to work together with the research team in a collaborative process in the problem analysis, design, and implementation of interventions. While the research partner was responsible for conducting the data collection and problem analysis, this work was to be informed and guided by the task force. Data collection, which was facilitated by the FBI liaison to the SACSI working group, involved active collaboration among the Detroit Police Department, Wayne County Community Justice, the Michigan Department of Corrections, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. The research team focused their analysis and evaluation on two Strategic Approach to Community Safety Initiative (SACSI) gun violence interventions in Detroit's Eighth Precinct.
The first intervention, "Operation 8-Ball," was a warrant sweep aimed at gun-involved offenders with outstanding warrants residing in the Eighth Precinct. Part 1, SACSI Monthly Gun Robberies Data, contains the monthly totals for stranger gun robberies in three Detroit precincts, collected to measure the impact of the "Operation 8-Ball" intensive warrant enforcement program conducted in late September 2001. One precinct represented the intervention precinct and two control precincts' monthly robbery totals were used for comparisons. A total of 60 monthly observations were collected. Electronic data aggregation of official crime reports were used to obtain the monthly counts.
The second strategy for addressing gun violence adopted by the working group was a gun-involved parolee supervision component entitled the Detroit SACSI Parolee Initiative. Part 2, SACSI Monthly Contact for Parolees Data, contains the monthly totals for a variety of parole contacts, collected to measure the intensity of a supervision program implemented for gun offenders, which commenced in July 2002. Part 2 also contains levels of parole violations in an intensive parole group in the Eighth Precinct of Detroit. The parolees were known gun offenders. A matched control group (age, offense, race, and gender) was drawn from the larger Detroit catchment. Parallel data were summarized for match group members. Monthly observations used intensive and match average levels of contact that were recorded in official parole records.
Part 1, SACSI Monthly Gun Robberies Data, contains six variables: year, month, and monthly gun robberies recorded in the Sixth, Eighth, and Tenth Precincts. A variable labeled, "Operation 8-ball intervention" identified if the data were collected in the pre- or postwarrant enforcement period.
Part 2, SACSI Monthly Contacts for Parolees Data, contains 16 variables including home contact rate, office contact rate, phone contact rate, collateral contact rate, the substance abuse violation rate, and the total violation ratio for both the SACSI intensive parole group and the matched control group. Other variables capture the total number of SACSI parolees on caseload for the month, as well as the total number of match parolees on caseload for the month. Other variables include the month/year observed and the pre- and postintensive supervision periods.
ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:
Terms of use are available at http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/ICPSR/studies/20353/terms
AVAILABLE. This study is freely available to the general public.