A Comprehensive Evaluation of a Drug Market Intervention Training Cohort in Roanoke, Virginia; Jacksonville, Florida; and Guntersville, Alabama, 2011-2013. (ICPSR 36322)
The Drug Market Intervention (DMI) has been identified as a promising practice for disrupting overt-drug markets, reducing the crime and disorder associated with drug sales, and improving police-community relations. Montgomery County, Maryland; Flint, Michigan; Guntersville, Alabama; Lake County, Indiana; Jacksonville, Florida; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Roanoke, Virginia applied for and received DMI training and technical assistance from Michigan State University in 2010 and 2011. This study followed the seven sites that were trained in the program to determine how the program was implemented, how the DMI affected the targeted drug market, whether the program affected crime and disorder, whether the program improved police-community relations, and how much the program cost.
Partners in Crisis: Improving Police Response to Individuals in Moments of Crisis by Providing Service Alternatives, Roanoke Valley, Virginia, 2022 (ICPSR 39294)
This project was an experimental evaluation of a collaborative partnership among the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy at George Mason University (CEBCP-GMU), Roanoke Police Department (RPD), Roanoke County Police Department (RCPD), Salem Police Department (SPD), and Vinton Police Department (VPD) as well as Blue Ridge Behavioral Healthcare (BRBH) in Roanoke Valley region of Virginia to conduct a place-based cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the effects of the co-responder model on subsequent outcomes of individuals who were experiencing a crisis and involved in mental health-related calls for service. Responding to incidents involving individuals with mental illness has been a challenge for police officers.
While co-response teams have been embraced as an effective police response strategy, most prior evaluation studies on co-response teams focused on outcomes that are not directly related to individuals' subsequent mental health state. Additionally, the lack of experimental research hinders our ability to draw causal conclusions on the effects of co-response teams. To address this knowledge gap, this study evaluated the effectiveness of co-response teams on hospitalization outcomes of individuals in crisis using a place-based randomized controlled trial in southwest Virginia.