Hello, I'm City Journal editor Brian Anderson.

Thanks for joining us for the 10 Blocks podcast

featuring urban policy and cultural commentary with City Journal editors, contributors, and special

guests.

A new policing approach, predictive policing, is being tested in several big cities across

the country. The method uses advanced algorithms and powerful computers

to predict where crime is most likely to occur

so police can then deploy officers to prevent it.

It sounds like science fiction, but is it for real?

Joining me today to discuss the emergence of predictive policing

is David Black, the scholar

and residence at Kirkland House at Harvard University, and a prize-winning novelist, journalist,

screenwriter, and television producer. David's fascinating new City Journal article, Big

Data on the Beat in our winter issue and available on our website, will be the starting

point of this discussion.

Welcome, David. Glad to be here.

Now let's start with three very basic questions to get oriented.

What exactly is predictive policing beyond what I just said?

Who invented it and can crime really be predicted in this way?

The last question first, yes. It seems to be able to be predicted and in 2014 in Foothills

Precinct, Los Angeles, California, there is a drop of 34 percent over the previous years

two-digit drop in crime compared to other precincts and the same precinct

...