Identifying the Spatio-Temporal Characteristics of Crime in Liangshan Prefecture, China

Crime prevention and governance play critical roles in public security management. Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province has a high crime rate, and spatio-temporal analysis of crime in this region could assist with public security management. Therefore, Liangshan Prefecture was selected as the research object in this study. The spatial crime data were obtained from China Judgments Online, and property crime, violent crime, and special crime (i.e., pornography, gambling, drugs, and guns) were analyzed. The findings were as follows. In terms of time characteristics (month, day, and hour), property crime tended to occur in autumn and winter, in the early month, on Wednesdays and Fridays, and at early morning. Violent crime tended to occur in winter and spring, on Mondays and Thursdays, and at night. Special crime occurred in spring and autumn, on Tuesdays, and in the daytime. In terms of spatial features, the central region of Liangshan Prefecture was the focal area for crime. There were obvious low-aggregation areas in the western region for special crime. The eastern region exhibited a high incidence of various crimes. Regarding the spatio-temporal evolution characteristics from 2013 to 2019, there were some obvious hotspots of violent and property crime in downtown and surrounding townships of Xichang City, which is the capital of Liangshan Prefecture. During the study period, the incidence of special crime has an obvious downward trend which shows that there are more new cold spots.