After a natural catastrophe, the crime rate drops because the people who are affected by it need to bond socially and adopt a more altruistic behaviour. This is what Frédéric Lemieux, Professor in the School of Criminology, found in the research for his doctorate, which is about the variance between observed and expected crime in two regions hit by the ice storm of January 1998: Montréal and the Montérégie region. “The hypothesis of a drop in crime associated with catastrophes has never been examined systematically before,” he notes. The relationship is not obvious, since catastrophes, in particular electrical blackouts, generally create conditions favourable to criminal acts, as happened in a generalized blackout in New York in 1977.

The results of his study actually show considerable variation, depending on the specific conditions in the regions studied.

Police presence, which was increased in Montréal and remained stable in Montérégie, is one of the variables. “Between January 5 and18, there were up to 1,750 policemen and 3,000 soldiers on duty each day in Montréal, whereas there are normally only 300 policemen on duty,” the Professor notes. “The presence of law enforcers had a direct, immediate effect on crimes against persons and crimes against property, which dropped by as much as 35%.”

On the other hand, the deterrent was much less effective in Montérégie, owing to the size of the territory and a delay in setting up an infrastructure for police operations. Whereas there were 10 officers per square kilometre in Montréal, where operations are already centralized, there was only one per square kilometre in the Montérégie. In the first days of the storm, when people still had no idea of the scale of the disaster, there was a substantial increase in crimes against property, up to 90% more in some cases. It seems that opportunity makes the thief.

In Montérégie, the correlation between fluctuations of blackouts and crime level is very high. “When Hydro-Québec announced that the crisis in this zone would last at least a month, crimes against property increased by 19% in the “black triangle” compared to the rest of the Montérégie,” the researcher notes. In fact, the curve dropped off gradually as people were reconnected.

Frédéric Lemieux nevertheless believes that the catastrophe caused an observable increase in altruistic behaviour, since the rise in crime should have been more pronounced in the Montérégie.

Researcher: Frédéric Lemieux
Telephone: (514) 343-5864