In 2021, the New York City Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice (MOCJ) engaged the assistance of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (JohnJayREC) to support several research and data analytic projects associated with the City’s efforts to improve public safety and the effectiveness of the justice system. John Jay College’s involvement in the NYC Police Reform and Reinvention Collaborative was coordinated by the College’s Office for the Advancement of Research and supported by $1.4M provided to the City University of New York (CUNY) and managed by the Research Foundation of CUNY (RF-CUNY), fiscal agent for all research projects housed at CUNY campuses.

City officials asked JohnJayREC staff to collaborate with NORC at the University of Chicago and researchers in other CUNY offices to conduct three distinct research projects:

Project 1: Assessment of Disparities in Justice Processing

To assess disparities in the use and impact of different enforcement tools in New York City, such as warnings, summonses, arrests, and desk appearance tickets for comparable offenses.

Researchers conducted spatiotemporal analyses combining population data with publicly available crime-related data, including arrests, complaints, and summonses, to create geographically specific indicators for a range of crimes to investigate whether criminal justice processing varies according to the race and ethnicity of justice-involved individuals and the demographic profile of their neighborhoods. Analyses explored disparities by crime type and charge severity and assessed how they changed in recent years. (Task 79 in the NYPD Reform Initiative Tracker.)

Project 2: Citizen-Police Contacts on Public Transportation and Their Subsequent Effects

To examine low-income New Yorkers’ access to public transportation and its relationship to contact with criminal justice systems.

Historical analysis of NYPD arrests and criminal summons data (2010 – 2022) and relationships between transit access and miscellaneous crime indicators, given neighborhood characteristics and resident demographics (Task 80 in the NYPD Reform Initiative Tracker.)

Project 3: Collateral Consequences of Justice Processing for Violations of Drug Laws

Analyze economic correlates of drug-related crimes and arrests among New York City neighborhoods.

Using publicly available data from the U.S. Census and other sources, NORC researchers will examine the economic correlates of drug-related criminal justice contacts among the residents of New York City neighborhoods. Drug arrests will be organized into categories, including possession, sale, etc. Researchers will examine arrests and justice contacts by census tract or other geographic boundaries. Economic indicators may include property values, tax assessments, or other data. (Task 84 in the NYPD Reform Initiative Tracker.)

Funding
$1.4 Million over 24 months.

JohnJayREC Staff
Jeffrey Butts (PI), John Roman (NORC), Rebecca Balletto, Patricia Cobar, Sheyla Delgado (Project Director), Richard Espinobarros, Gina Moreno, Rhoda Ramdeen, and Kathleen Tomberg.