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McCleary/Rural Hotspots 155 Although the question of urban—rural generality is only one of many weighed in the Tenth Circuit's decision, it is the central question of this essay. Because most crim- inological research has been conducted in nonrural areas, criminological theories do not necessarily generalize to rural crime. Because relatively little crime occurs in rural areas, of course, few criminologists are interested in urban—rural questions. Following the Tenth Circuit's Abilene Retail decision,on the other hand, urban—rural differences are acutely relevant to policy makers and courts. The potential cost of the decision is staggering. In the best case, local governments will be forced to rewrite ordinances to cover businesses located in more rural areas. In the worst case, litigious adult businesses will have an incentive to relocate to rural areas, forcing trial courts to judge the relative ruralness of areas,case by case. In any case, extrapolating the Tenth Circuit's argument to other variables not explicitly addressed by criminological theory threatens the ability of local governments to mit- igate public safety hazards associated with adult businesses. This essay addresses the threshold question of whether criminological theories can be generalized to rural areas. Although the generalization may be difficult for some criminological theories, the relevant theory of"hotspots" (Sherman, Gartin, & Buerger, 1989) applies to any accessible area, rural or urban.After describing the rel- evant criminological theory, 1 report the results of a corroborating quasi-experimental case study. When an adult business is opened on an interstate highway off-ramp in a sparsely populated rural community, ambient crime risk rises precipitously, in effect making a hotspot of the community. The Criminological Theory of Secondary Effects Writing shortly after the advent of Uniform Crime Reports,Vold (1941) confirmed that a city's crime rate was proportional to its population.The observed relationship had an obvious explanation: "[B]ehavior in the country in all probability comes under much greater informal control of the opinions and disapprovals of the neighbors than is the case in the relative anonymity of the city" (p. 38). The negative correlation confirmed not only grand sociological theory (e.g., ninnies, 1887/1963; Durkheim, 1893/1964) but also the related criminological theory of social disorganization. As proposed by Shaw and McKay (1942), the theory of social disorganization predicts that neighborhoods with low residential stability will have high rates of delinquency and vice versa.To the extent that a small town has the characteristics of a stable neighborhood, social disorganization theory would predict the low crime rates observed by Vold (1941). Moreover, when a small town is disrupted by an influx of newcomers, the same theory predicts an abrupt increase in the town's crime rate. This can occur in at least two ways. First, the newcomers may victimize the town's residents. Indeed, fear of victimization by newcomers is implicated in the rapid spread of gated communities (Blandy, Lister,Atkinson, &Flint, 2003). Second, the influx of newcomers may disrupt the town's routine activities in a way that IS 2008 SDAG lPdc aftoOm n ah.t A;/ gss reasu a a1h4LmIFeOrRciA u sIRe V oINr uE noan u Mhaor 2z5e,d 2 di0s8 t rbution.