Matt Ashby @LessCrime

I help people use data to reduce crime. Associate Professor at @UCLCrimeScience. Former police officer. lesscrime.info Nottingham and London, UK Joined April 2009

Tweets

21K
Followers

6K
Following

1K
Likes

32K

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 days ago

@trainfanmatt @SimonZev You are of-course free to think whatever you like, but all the evidence says that the frequency of metal theft from railways is substantially influenced by copper prices. e.g. doi.org/10.1177/002242… doi.org/10.1177/002242… doi.org/10.1007/s10940… doi.org/10.1177/056943…

0 0 0 27 0

View Details

@trainfanmatt @SimonZev It’s been known for many years that the price of copper on the wholesale market affects how much railway metal theft there is. The reason is pretty much common sense: the higher the price of copper, the bigger the incentive for thieves to steal it.

1 0 2 190 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

5 days ago

Fantastic @_ReducingCrime podcast discussion between my colleague Shane Johnson and @Jerry_Ratcliffe on some of the many ways all types of crime are changing due to technology. Essential listening if you’re interested in crime of any sort. m.soundcloud.com/reducingcrime/…

0 2 6 633 5

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

6 days ago

Requiring professionals to report possible child abuse to police (🇫🇮) was associated with – more incidents recorded by police – no increase in prosecutions – a big increase in investigation times suggesting the rule simply overwhelmed police capacity doi.org/10.1007/s10610…

1 2 2 421 3

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

6 days ago

@HermanL45290384 @Claire331926616 @LucyGoBag Quite possibly. You’ve no idea (and neither do I) what other incidents were happening at the same time. Hopefully they’ll work out what went wrong to prevent it happening again.

1 0 1 28 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

6 days ago

@Claire331926616 @LucyGoBag Claire, why do you assume they couldn’t give a damn, rather than that something went wrong that meant the pre-arranged plan didn’t work?

2 0 1 70 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

7 days ago

@Takeastepback16 @StuartW90274038 @raibgovuk Apparently it’s about 1,200 metres. railforums.co.uk/threads/report…

0 0 1 42 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

@Takeastepback16 @StuartW90274038 @raibgovuk The signal passed at red is the previous signal prior to the signal at the collision site – details in the RAIB interim report linked above.

1 0 0 153 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

@Jerry_Ratcliffe @_ReducingCrime What one thing would you change about policing if you could? That could be specifically about American policing (since I imagine that’s most of your audience) or policing in general. It’s specifically a question about change to policing, though, not other organisations/society!

0 0 3 339 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

@NicholasLe81575 @philatrail There are clearer pictures elsewhere showing all the carriages of both trains remained upright, albeit with some having been derailed by the collision.

0 0 0 34 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

0 0 1 203 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

@HotDoge42 @philatrail What narrative do you think he’s pushing?

0 0 0 41 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

a week ago

@EastMidRailway @Discostu_20 “the rest of the week” is really unclear language for a statement issued on a Sunday. Can you clarify that, as it stands at the moment, the line will be closed until at least 26 June?

2 0 1 206 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@gecantab @WhigRevival @MattSingh_ Because the governments of those countries specify that Spain, Austria, Germany, etc are the official English names of those countries. The Turkish government changed the official English name to Türkiye a few years back.

3 0 2 58 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@Diogenes1 @Steven_Swinford @YouGov Survation polled labour members about a month ago and found Burnham would beat Starmer in a leadership contest by 61% to 28%. labourlist.org/2026/05/labour…

0 0 1 93 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@DevaPete @willnorman That’s interesting. What sort of near misses have you seen? Having used the two-stage right turn quite a few times, I can’t really think of how it might be unsafe.

1 0 0 12 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@netmnp @TLRailUK @loisamber16 Services are definitely still impacted, and certainly will be until the end of the day:

Politics UK @PolitlcsUK

2 weeks ago

🚨 PICTURED: The high-speed East Midlands Railway train that has collided with a commuter train near Bedford

258 1K 9K 4.4M 941

1 0 1 586 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

Ethnic disparities in police stops/traffic tickets (🇺🇸) substantially reduced (and for some groups disappeared) when comparing stops/tickets to demographics of people caught by automated red-light cameras rather than comparing to residential population. crimrxiv.com/pub/2zpvatvy/r…

0 1 6 1K 2

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@DevaPete @willnorman * turn right. Apologies.

0 0 0 14 0

View Details

Matt Ashby @LessCrime

2 weeks ago

@DevaPete @willnorman It’s entirely possible to turn left with the cars if you’re happy crossing the motor-vehicle lanes (as it was before). But it’s also now possible to avoid that potentially dangerous manoeuvre by using the two-stage turn. And it’s possible to do either without swearing.