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This paper studies the impact of immigration enforcement on both public safety and victim willingness to contact the police. While heightened immigration enforcement may improve safety by incapacitating serious offenders, safety may suffer if victims are unwilling to report crime. We examine the Secure Communities program, which increased cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration authorities and significantly increased the volume of detentions and deportations of unauthorized migrants. Using survey data from the U.S. Census Bureau, we find that Hispanic individuals are more likely to become victims of a crime after the program's introduction, and that Hispanic individuals who are victims of a crime are less likely to report their incident to the police. These two opposing effects result in a null impact of the program on reported crime, explaining previous studies' findings that this program did not alter reported crime rates. We also find no corresponding increase in victimization or decline in reporting among non-Hispanic individuals. We provide evidence that the decline in Hispanic reporting is a key channel driving their increased victimization. Our findings shed light on the importance of directly measuring victim reporting practices for understanding the impact of criminal justice policies.
Presenter(s)
Felipe Goncalves, University of California, Los Angeles
Non-Presenting Authors
Emily Weisburst, University of California, Los Angeles
Elisa Jacome, Northwestern University
Immigration Enforcement, Crime, and Community Trust in Police
Category
Organized Session Abstract Submission
Description
Session: [194] ADVANCES IN LAW, ECONOMICS, AND CRIME
Date: 7/4/2023
Time: 4:30 PM to 6:15 PM
Date: 7/4/2023
Time: 4:30 PM to 6:15 PM