Criminal career trajectories

Tom Kirchmaier, Daniel Matter and Miriam Schirmer

CEP Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Performance, LSE

Abstract: This study analyzes criminal career trajectories using a unique administrative dataset of 230,578 offenders and over 620,000 criminal offenses recorded by Greater Manchester Police between 2008 and 2019. Moving beyond static co-offending networks, we model individual offense sequences as transitions within a multilayer directed crime network. This allows us to capture temporal dependence and structural progression across crime types and provides an approach that can be used as a scalable method to analyze criminal trajectories at the population level. We find that the majority of offenders (almost 60%) commit only a single recorded offense. Among repeat offenders, specialization deepens over time: the likelihood of committing the same type of crime again rises steadily across consecutive offenses, most strongly for shoplifting, burglary, and fraud. Only 9.14% of persistent offenders remain within a single crime category throughout their recorded career, making diversification the norm rather than the exception among high-frequency offenders. Within these cross-category transitions, public order offenses and weapon possession consistently precede violent crime at every career stage, suggesting structured pathways that may serve as early intervention points.

Keywords: crime networks; crime trajectories; network analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-04-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-law and nep-soc
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp2168

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