A designer conducts random searches to detect criminals, and may condition the search probability on individuals' appearance. She updates her belief about the distribution of criminals across appearances using her search results, but incorrectly takes her sample distribution for the population...

A designer conducts random searches to detect criminals, and may condition the search probability on individuals' appearance. She updates her belief about the distribution of criminals across appearances using her search results, but incorrectly takes her sample distribution for the population...

In their article “An Alternative Test of Racial Prejudice in Motor Vehicle Searches: Theory and Evidence,” published in the American Economic Review in 2006, Shamena Anwar and Hanming Fang study racial prejudice in motor vehicle searches by Florida Highway Patrol officers (“troopers”)....

We model major criminal activity as a game in which a law enforcement officer chooses the rate at which to screen different population groups and a criminal organization (e.g., drug cartel, terrorist cell) chooses the observable characteristics of its recruits. Our model best describes smuggling...