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To Catch a Thief: Endogenous Policing and Choice of Location by Criminals

Author

Listed:
  • Siddhartha Bandyopadhyay
  • Antonio Cabrales
  • Kaustav Das

Abstract

This paper develops a tractable model of offender location choice and police resource allocation across multiple areas. Individuals differ in the cost of apprehension and choose whether to commit crime and, if so, where. Each area contains a fixed value of criminal opportunities, so offenders impose congestion on one another, while policing affects expected apprehension. For arbitrary policing levels, equilibrium sorts offenders by apprehension cost across areas ordered by policing per unit of criminal opportunity value. With a fixed police budget, welfare maximization equalizes policing-to-value ratios across all active areas. The model shows when place-based policing should target the value of criminal opportunities rather than observed crime counts alone, since observed crime may already reflect prior police allocation and offender displacement.

Suggested Citation

  • Siddhartha Bandyopadhyay & Antonio Cabrales & Kaustav Das, 2026. "To Catch a Thief: Endogenous Policing and Choice of Location by Criminals," CESifo Working Paper Series 12756, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12756
    as

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    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D62 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Externalities
    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
    • R12 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity; Interregional Trade (economic geography)

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