The Statistics of Fighting Crime

Former Attorney General of New Jersey Anne Milgram explores the benefits of using data and statistics in the criminal justice system in her crime reduction speech. Milgram collected extensive data on crime and criminals including race, existing record, crimes committed, etc. and utilized it to analyse the level of risk a specific offender poses to the public and whether to keep them locked up or not.

Anne Milgram compares her system of risk assessment to the Moneyball program, which had baseball managers choosing players using stats and data as an unbiased assessment of their skills. Milgram’s crime reduction speech goes on to explain that judges should use these criminal risk assessments along with their own assessment because they lack an objective measure of risk. These data-based, risk-assessment tools will help judges, prosecutors and police make better decisions in the criminal justice system.