Crime, Justice and Security
Matrix has been at the forefront of reforms within the crime and justice sector in Europe for over ten years. Now, with our office in Washington DC, we are able to offer our global experience to support service improvement in local agencies, national governments and international organizations through the provision of evidence based research, consulting and supportive web based decision analytics. Our work is informed by a wide array of US and international thought leaders and notable practitioners from academia, law enforcement and other areas of the justice system.
Enhancing police and inter-agency collaboration
| Recent Project: | Development of a collaborative evaluation and knowledge-sharing platform |
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| Client: | UK Home Office and UK National Police Improvement Agency |
| Timeframe: | 2007 – 2010 |
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Effective, timely information sharing among different agencies is a key challenge for homeland security. Matrix is supporting the UK Home Office and UK National Police Improvement Agency to evaluate the effectiveness of a program to improve collaboration among 35 police forces. This program, focusing on a range of protective services provided by the police, seeks to ensure that police deal effectively with terrorism, extremism, serious crime, and other major threats to public safety.
Matrix is leading a three-year action research initiative on this program. The Matrix team developed web-based data collection and analysis tools for key aspects of the research. In addition, Matrix created an innovative web-based collaboration portal to enable online collaboration among police officers and police managers participating in the pilot program. The new portal lets them draft joint policies and procedures, share information about innovations and examples of best practices, and highlight barriers to implementing change. Microsoft has featured this project in a published case study.
Understanding the dynamics of illicit markets
| Recent Projects: | The Illicit Drug Trade in the United Kingdom Routes of Trafficking: A Rapid Evidence Assessment Study on Asset Recovery and Confiscation: Assessing Effectiveness Study to Assess Extent of Abuse of Non-Profit Organizations to Finance Criminal and Terrorist Purposes |
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| Clients: | UK Home Office Border and Immigration Agency European Commission |
| Timeframe: | 2006-2009 |
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Black market economies such as drug trafficking, human trafficking, and prostitution present troubling new challenges for policy makers in a global society. Improved understanding of how these markets function helps policy makers implement evidence-based countermeasures and improve resource allocation.
Matrix has extensive research and policy experience in examining organized crime, transnational crime, and security issues. Where a strong international evidence base exists, Matrix utilizes Rapid Evidence Assessments (REAs) to provide decision-makers with a clear, concise review of the current evidence base. Where the evidence base is weak, Matrix undertakes extensive, rigorous primary research.
Recent primary research includes: a study of the illicit drug trade in the UK, based on a series of interviews with over 250 convicted high-level drug traffickers; a comprehensive review of current asset seizure and confiscation measures across 27 European Union member states; and a study to determine the extent of criminal or terrorist financial abuses within non-profit organizations across the EU. Recent REAs include a review of human trafficking routes, and an assessment of abuse and exploitation of domestic workers.
Improving performance of corrections and probation services
| Recent Project: | Develop a web-based performance reporting and management system for national corrections and probation service |
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| Client: | UK Ministry of Justice |
| Timeframe: | 2007 – present |
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Performance management in correction services typically relies on case-level data from hundreds of thousands of pre-sentencing reports, bail reports, and prison files. In the UK, individual-level data are collected on a number of different legacy systems across the nearly 200 probation services and prisons within England and Wales. Previously, performance management relied on a cumbersome process: local performance management reports were manually created by data analysts and subsequently validated by the Ministry of Justice. Delays and inefficiencies within the system meant that reports were validated too slowly to inform performance management and data often sat unseen and unused in databases and spreadsheets.
To address the challenges of out-dated and under-utilized performance data, Matrix developed a web-based informatics tool that provides reliable, timely and relevant data to inform performance management decisions. As a result, corrections and probation staff, managers and policy makers now have web access to key performance indicators in dashboard format. This new system supports ad hoc analysis, allowing timely responses to investigative queries as well as automated slice and-dice analyses.