A Bayesian Hierarchical Model for Criminal Investigations

How to better support police to prevent terrorist attacks continues to be a major political concern due to continued violence perpetrated by extremists [13, 2]. In contrast to the majority of terrorist incidents in the latter half of the twentieth century which were executed by known organised terrorist groups with substantial planning and sophistication, more recent attacks have often involved individuals or small groups targeting civilians in public places using basic equipment such as vehicles, guns and knives [13, 23]. Consequentially this entails less sophistication in materials, planning and execution. In terms of analysing how to understand and prevent terrorism, criminologist focus has shifted from "individual qualities (who we think terrorists'are') to ... what