Modeling tourism crime

Abstract

Between October 1999 and March 2000, Auckland, New Zealand hosted the largest sporting event ever held in the country, the America's Cup Yacht Race. This paper investigates the impact of this race on destination crime rates, especially against tourists: it statistically models tourism-related crime observing that there was no significant difference between the victimization rates of domestic and overseas tourists. They rather were affected by ethnicity and form of accommodation. The type of crime experienced by overseas tourists differs from that for domestic ones in that foreigners are more subject to theft from places such as the casino or a campervan. Domestic tourists are more likely to experience smaller losses as a result of theft from their cars.