Regional crime is a branch of criminological research that studies the specifics of crime caused by the specific geographical, demographic, economic, historical, socio-cultural and other conditions of individual territories. The purpose of this study is to characterise the methods of studying regional crime, to show the specifics of their application in the study of regional crime. The specificity of regional studies is manifested in the complex study of territorial features of crime, as well as the existing demographic, economic, social, cultural, organisational, national, environmental, legal and other conditions of the region that contribute to the development of criminogenic processes. General scientific methods of cognition of regional crime are dialectical, historical and systemic methods. The historical method provides the identification of regularities of regional crime development in the historical section, in motion, for which it is necessary to study socio-economic and criminological indicators of crime in the region for quite a long time. The use of the system method allows us to study crime in interrelation with the phenomena and processes occurring in the region, having specificity; as well as the impact of crime on regional processes. The comparative method is the basis for identifying the territorial characteristics of crime. The comparative method reveals the peculiarities of the state, structure and dynamics of crime in a particular territory, the specifics of its causal complex, differences in the personal characteristics of criminals, the conditions of their formation and life activity. Among private methods of studying regional crime, in addition to traditional statistical and sociological methods, methods of correlation and cluster analysis are used. The peculiarity of the use of statistical method in regional studies is that the level and structure of crime are analysed in comparison with other regions, as well as the average values for the country, federal district, republic, krai, oblast. In such a study, attention should be paid to the objectivity of data on the population of the region. The use of correlation analysis in the study of regional crime is carried out to establish the relationship between crime indicators and individual factors affecting the criminogenic situation in the region. Cluster analysis makes it possible to divide regions into groups with a certain socio-criminological situation according to certain characteristics.
