TAKING THE LEAD FROM UK CRIME STRATEGY

UCFV Grad Student Brings Home Crime Reduction Ideas

Sherry Bot, a graduate student at the University College of the
Fraser Valley, had the chance to do some in-depth applied research on
a recent trip to England.

Bot, who is enrolled in the second year UCFV's first Master of
Criminal Justice class, was part of a City of Surrey-sponsored
fact-finding tour looking at the crime reduction model as it's being
applied successfully in the United Kingdom.

"Part of crime reduction looks at targeting prolific offenders," Bot
said. "Since most crime is committed by a very small percentage of
the criminal population, if you focus on them and changing their
behaviour, it can result in real reduction in crime rates.

MA Criminology student Sherry Bot was thrilled to be part of a
fact-finding mission on crime reduction to England recently.

"The crime reduction model encourages inter-agency cooperation, so
that the education, health care, policing, probation, youth
counselling, corrections, fire, and housing agencies are all working
together," she reported.

"A big part of crime reduction is drug intervention, since so many
crimes are committed by addicts desperate for money to get their next
fix," she added. "So the British crime reduction model ensures that
people who test positive for drugs upon arrest can be in treatment
the same day. If they refuse, they face jail time."

Bot's master's thesis focuses on the role of inter-agency
partnerships at the local level, so when she was invited to join the
Surrey group on their British tour, she jumped at the chance.

"Surrey is launching a pilot project incorporating some of the
British practices, so they went for a closer look at what would
transfer over well," she noted.

"It was a great opportunity to meet with people working at the ground
level, applying these crime reduction strategies on a day-to-day
basis," she said. "They put on an excellent series of meetings on
topics such as drug intervention, and successes and challenges of
different strategies and initiatives they've incorporated, and they
really encouraged our questions."

Her trip costs were covered by three sponsors: the City of Surrey,
the RCMP's E Division, and the Solicitor General of B.C, through a
research grant it has provided to UCFV.

Bot will be sharing information from her thesis, which will include
an examination of how the British crime reduction model can be
applied in a Canadian context, and a literature review she's
conducting on the crime reduction model, with the City of Surrey.

"The fact that two levels of government and the RCMP thought it
worthwhile to sponsor Sherry's trip to England as part of her
graduate studies research is a real vote of confidence in our new
master's degree in criminal justice," noted Dr. Darryl Plecas, senior
research chair in the Criminology/Criminal Justice department.

"It's also an example of the cooperation with agencies in the
criminal justice field that is a hallmark of our program."