ABSTRACT
In Chapter 4, Crime in Real Time: Immediacy, Immersion, Engagement, we use the violent attacks on the Stade de France, Bataclan, and a number of Parisian bars and restaurants in November 2015 as a heuristic through which we explore the real-time digital experiences of both citizens and justice officials responding to crimes as they happen. In this chapter, we outline the nature and role of digital technologies in enabling community engagement with crime, and highlight the potential for citizen engagement to both help and hinder law enforcement and other justice agency responses. We argue that digital community engagement with real time crime has the potential to disrupt and amplify traditional law and order narratives. We suggest that digital technologies provide new platforms for the dissemination of alternative discourses, facts and resistances to crime and justice issues, and offer citizens more active participation in the selection and consumption of news information.
