Crime Scripting

Bringing together leading and emerging international researchers, this edited volume offers a comprehensive exploration of crime scripting’s methodological aspects, empirical applications, and practical relevance.

Introduced in 1994 in crime science and crime prevention studies, crime scripting is an analytical method developed to generate, organize, and systematize knowledge about the procedural aspects and requirements of specific forms of crime. Over the past three decades, it has become an increasingly important approach in both academic research and professional practice.

Organized in three parts, the book explores:

• the development of crime scripting as a method, including its integration with techniques such as social network analysis
• empirical crime scripts across a range of crimes, including illicit drug and firearms trafficking, environmental crime, and cybercrime
• practical applications drawn from law enforcement agencies and multi-agency partnerships.

By combining methodological reflection with empirical and operational perspectives, this volume provides both a foundational introduction and a contemporary overview of one of the most influential analytical approaches in crime science.

Crime scripting is valuable for the study, prevention, and control of crime, making it relevant to researchers and students as well as policymakers and practitioners, including police officers, analysts, and professionals working in multi-agency settings.