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Home > Programs > Attacking Serious and Organised Crime Research Program > Investigative and Innovation
Investigative and Innovation
This research project aims to explore the effectiveness of criminal investigations, intelligence methods and best practice responses to certain criminal acts and behaviours. The process of investigations is a key focus, including the models/roles, functions and methods of intelligence gathering in policing, national security and peacekeeping contexts. The experiences of victims and their reporting behaviour are also included and incorporates work on victim surveys (including corporate victims) and threat (fear of crime etc.) perceptions.
Additional capacity has been provided by Dr Grant Wardlaw who commenced mid 2010 and has wide experience in leadership in intelligence in policing. He will lead research on the best practices and uses of intelligence for investigations and this project will engage two PhD candidates on related topics including comparative models of intelligence-led policing and undercover policing. Dr Wardlaw’s research examines the changing environment for intelligence, especially in law enforcement, in response to changing concepts of national security and developments in the nature and extent of transnational crime and other non-traditional security challenges. It analyses both the conceptual underpinnings of emerging intelligence philosophy and doctrine, as well as their practical application. Areas of focus in this research include risk assessment and intelligence, the extension of intelligence practice to the area of peacekeeping/peace enforcement, the role of knowledge management in intelligence, the ethical dilemmas inherent in emerging intelligence practice, and the development of intelligence capabilities in the Asia-Pacific region.
During 2010, two research proposals were developed with Victoria Police addressing investigations and criminal facilitators. A viable and feasible research project on effective investigations was not possible due to constraints on data access and design. Additional research projects with Victoria Police are anticipated and a project looking at the role of professional delinquents is under development with the New South Wales Crime Commission. A workshop on homicide investigations will be held at the University of Glamorgan (UK) in June 2011 and a similar invited symposium led by Professor Martin Innes (one of the UK’s leading scholars of complex investigations) is scheduled for July 2011 in Melbourne.
Research papers from an industry focussed workshop at ANU in December 2009 have been published as special issues on investigations (Peter Grabosky (ed) (2010) Perspectives on Criminal Investigation, Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, Special Issue, volume 26, number 4) and white collar crime (see Neal Shover and Peter Grabosky (eds) (2010) The Global Economy, Economic Crisis, and White Collar Crime, Criminology and Public Policy, Special Issue, volume 9, issue 3, (August). Related work on homicide behavior (see Chan, A., Beh, S. and Broadhurst R. (2010), To Flee or Not: ‘Escaping behavior’ of Intimate Homicide Offenders in Hong Kong, Homicide Studies,Vol. 14 (4): 400-418) and victimisation were completed.
The work on victims included Brigitte Bouhours’ technical assistance for the National University of Singapore (A/Prof Wing Cheong, Law) International Violence Against Women Survey (IVAWS) on October 7-11, 2010. The work also includes the Hong Kong survey of the IVAWS in collaboration with the University of Hong Kong, and a large-scale survey of business crime victims in four cities in China and personal crime victims in Hong Kong and Cambodia. Results of the HK IVAWS was presented at the Australian and New Zealand Society of Criminology (ANZSOC) Conference in Alice Springs by Brigitte Bouhours and Roderic Broadhurst, on ‘Hong Kong International Violence Against Women Survey’, September 27-30.
The paper by Broadhurst and Hong Kong colleagues Professor Beh and Dr Aris Chan, ‘To Flee or Not: ‘Escaping behavior’ of Intimate Homicide Offenders in Hong Kong’ (Homicide Studies,Vol. 14 (4): 400-418, 2010) found that among 112 homicides involving sexual intimates that occurred in Hong Kong between 1989 and 2002, 38% (n 42) of offenders remained voluntarily at the homicide scene, 21% (n 24) committed suicide, 20% (n 22) escaped and denied involvement, 13% (n 14) disposed or hid the body of their victim, and 9% (n 10) escaped but later voluntarily surrendered. The type of response was explained by the offender’s characteristics, the strength of attachment to the victim, and situational factors. The offender’s prior criminal conduct or history of violence was not significant in predicting the type of postkilling response.
Investigations/Facilitators
Professor Roderic Broadhurst (Chief Investigator)
Julie Ayling (Research Fellow)
Brigitte Bouhours (Research Assistant)
Dr Nicholas Farrelly (Research Fellow)
Dr Grant Wardlaw (Senior Research Fellow)
Intelligence and Investigative methods
Professor Rod Broadhurst (Chief Investigator)
Dr Grant Wardlaw (Senior Research Fellow)
Natasha Tusikov (PhD Student)
Simon Bonney (PhD Student)
