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22 Criminology & Crim. Just. 3 (2022)

handle is hein.journals/crmcj22 and id is 1 raw text is: Article Criminology & Criminal justice 2022, Vol. 22(1) 3-23 The hom icide drop in England @TheAuors)2020 and Wales 2004-2014 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1 177/1748895820930761 journals.sagepub.com/home/cri Caroline Miles OSAGE The University of Manchester, UK Emily Buehler. University of Oxford, UK Abstract After decades of rising homicide rates in the late 20th century, much of the Western world witnessed a decline in homicide from the early-mid- 1990s. In England and Wales, homicide rates defied this trend and continued to rise for a further decade, peaking in 2004 before declining year on year until 2014. The late onset of the decline in England and Wales presents a quandary for dominant explanations of the broader decline, and has yet to be theorised. This article presents a disaggregated analysis of the homicide drop in England and Wales, identifying subtypes of homicide that appear to have driven the decline. The findings indicate changes in lifestyle, routine activities and social/criminal justice policy as the main drivers of the homicide drop, and contribute to international theory on homicide trends. Keywords Homicide decline, homicide drop, homicide trends Introduction Homicide rates in England and Wales witnessed consecutive increases between 2014 and 2018,1 reportedly driven by an upturn in fatal knife-attacks involving teenagers (Ellis, 2019; Younge, 2018). This incline interrupted the longer-term decline in homicide observed from the mid-2000s, that forms the basis of this article. The steady decrease in homicide in England and Wales between 2004 and 2014 followed a similar pattern to Corresponding author: Caroline Miles, Department of Criminology, School of Social Sciences, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M 13 9PL, UK. Email: caroline.miles@manchester.ac.uk