This paper, which is the introduction to this special issue on ‘Spaces of Organised Crime’, aims to analyse the nexus between organised crime groups and territories. Such groups are able to exploit resources that circulate within territorial contexts in which they are embedded. They also operate concretely as entities that can take part to the transformation of spaces into places. Accordingly, we will

This article contributes to our existing knowledge through a crime script analysis of contract killings, based on six extensively analyzed police investigations in the Netherlands. Starting from a universal crime script, a more specific crime script for contract killings is elaborated. To provide a clear picture of the whole process, the description of the scenes focuses on requirements, facilitators

How do criminal groups organize, operate, and govern in Denmark? We argue that organized crime groups face governance challenges in the form of principal-agent problems and transaction costs. Based on interviews with law enforcement officers, former gang members, and prisoners, we provide evidence for how people involved in crime respond to these organizational dilemmas. We find that the more severe

This paper presents a review of the key Australian legislation passed between 2009 and 2019 targeting outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs). It identifies the key similarities and differences across the reforms and provides examples of the legislation being used to disrupt serious and organised crime activity by OMCGs. It also presents some of the barriers to effective enforcement of the legislation. There

This paper provides some reflections on the articles and the report excerpt included in the special issue of Trends in Organised Crime on organised crime and money laundering policy. The aim of this special issue to invite the reader to re-examine conventional wisdom in this issue area. The papers in this special issue emphasise the variation in policy measures, as they articulate the interplay between

A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12117-021-09405-2

A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12117-020-09404-9

This paper is guided by the question: How do illicit practices of organized groups contribute to the formation and reproduction of disadvantaged neighbourhoods in Czechia? By asking this question we depart from the dominant understanding of disadvantaged neighbourhoods in the study of organized crime. Instead of seeing them as “breeding grounds of organized crime”, it is explored how regular neighbourhoods

Money laundering has ascended the enforcement and criminological agenda in the course of this century, and has been accompanied by an increased focus on legal professionals as ‘enablers’ of crime. This article explores the dynamics of this enforcement, media and political agenda, and how the legal profession has responded in the UK and elsewhere, within the context of ignoring the difficulties of judging

The article will present the results of a qualitative research into organized crime in the Italian port system. It is a pioneering attempt to assess an extensive and diachronic perspective on the presence and activities of organized crime groups into the Italian seaports in order to provide a systematic analytical map through the analysis of institutional law enforcement reports. The article attempts

Based on the conceptualizations of organized crime as both an enterprise and a form of governance, borderland as a spatial category, and borders as institutions, this paper looks at the politics of bordering practices by organized crime in the Colombian-Venezuelan borderlands. It posits that contrary to the common assumptions about transnational organized crime, criminal organizations not only blur

Spaces occupied by organised crime are usually kept secret, hidden, invisible. Japanese criminal syndicates, the yakuza, made instead visibility a key feature of the spaces they occupy through an overt display of their presence in the territory: in the past, a yakuza headquarter could have been instantly recognised by the crest and group name emblazoned on the front wall. However, recent changes in

As an important gateway to Europe, the Port of Rotterdam is known for its high-quality facilities and efficiency, but also attracts organised crime groups who use the transatlantic legal trade flows to traffic cocaine. Based on a qualitative study, consisting of 73 interviews with public and private actors, an analysis of 10 criminal investigations and field visits to public and private organisations

Economic geographers have traditionally been reluctant to extend their analysis to illicit and illegal markets despite their being significant in their global economic extent and displaying highly uneven geographies. By contrast, the geographies of licit, legal industries have produced multiple traditions of empirically rich, theoretically diverse accounts. Our understandings of the spatialities of

Money laundering is not a victimless crime. Under certain circumstances, it may lead to significant criminal violence. We analyze the specific case of money laundering in local economies. Criminal organizations invest dirty money in legal local businesses, which may lead to short-term improvements in the economy that benefit the population. Authorities with access to local information may (purposely)

Human smuggling towards Europe has reached an unprecedented level in the last years. The past decade has seen an intensification of the demand for irregular migration services, which increased the role of smuggling rings as service providers to assist irregular migrants in evading national border controls, migration regulations and visa requirements. These criminal organizations feature an entrepreneurial

This study is a spinoff of the cross-disciplinary project “FloraGuard: Tackling the Illegal Trade in Endangered Plants”, and focuses on the analysis of online forums dedicated to the discussion and the trades of plant species, often highly endangered in nature, that are sought after for their psychotropic properties. The study sheds light on the interesting but overlooked area of the intersection of

Enforcement, ranging from threats to intimidation to assault to homicide, has long been an established practice within criminal networks. However, comparatively little academic research exists about the nature and role of enforcers within and beyond the context of contract killings. Drawing on qualitative interviews with criminal enforcers from two contrasting sites within the UK—the West Scotland

Historically, the poaching of wildlife was portrayed as a small-scale local activity in which only small numbers of wildlife would be smuggled illegally by collectors or opportunists. Nowadays, this image has changed: criminal networks are believed to be highly involved in wildlife trafficking, which has become a significant area of illicit activity. Even though wildlife trafficking has become accepted

Organised crime saw swift ascent as a security priority for the international community after the end of the Cold War. High political excitement surrounded the subject of organised crime, accompanied by an apparently bottomless demand for calculations of its magnitude and attendant risks. Over ensuing decades, concerns were repeatedly raised about the limitations afflicting pertinent cross-national

This is the untold history of how prominent civil servants in the UK tailored US-devised anti-money laundering (AML) policies in ways that suited the needs of Britain’s financial services industry. In the aftermath of these initial compromises in 1987, criminal money managers in both the US and the UK were able to continue to operate in an environment that easily allowed them to hide and use dirty

The Golden Triangle—the area where the borders of Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar converge—is considered one of the most complicated narcotics-trafficking hotspots in the world. More research is needed, however, to understand the supply and demand resources as well as the overall structure of transnational narcotics trafficking (TransNT) in this area and neighboring regions. The present paper provides

According to data from Mexico’s National Crime Victimization and Public Security Surveys (ENVIPE), from 2010 through 2017, home robberies involving an interaction between a victim and an aggressor occurred every two minutes and resulted in more than 257,000 injuries. The objective of this study is to explore whether victims of home robberies in Mexico are more likely to report an injury if perpetrators

In this paper we provide a presentation of the most popular metrics and systematically apply them to seven terrorist networks studied in the literature and to three new ISIS-affiliated networks. This study then investigates the correlates between structural network characteristics and severity of the attack carried out by the terrorists. Such approach allows us to analyze these networks from several

This is an introduction to the articles submitted to the special issue of Trends in Organized Crime on ‘Illegal Labour Practices, Trafficking and Exploitation’. The aim of the special issue is to draw together empirical research findings and theoretical accounts on the wider context to illegal labour and exploitation that has implications for identification, detection, prevention and regulation.

Despite considerable concern about how human trafficking offenders may use the Internet to recruit their victims, arrange logistics or advertise services, the Internet-trafficking nexus remains unclear. This study explored the prevalence and correlates of a set of commonly-used indicators of labour trafficking in online job advertisements. Taking a case study approach, we focused on a major Lithuanian

Specialization in criminal activities generally refers to offenders that repeat the same or similar offenses over time. While some research has found support for offender specialization, most empirical studies suggest that most offenders engage in various forms of offenses during their criminal trajectory and fail to specialize in a specific offense. The aim of this paper is to build on past research

Using wave 5 of the National Income Dynamics Study (conducted in 2017), this paper investigates the market for very low-priced cigarettes in South Africa, which, in all probability, are illicit. Since the sum of the excise tax and VAT in 2017 amounted to R16.30 (1.22 USD) per pack, any cigarettes selling for R20 (1.50 USD) per pack or less are likely to be illicit, assuming reasonable production costs

This paper examines the early precursors of organized criminal subcultures using the U.S.-Mexico border city of El Paso, Texas as a case-study. El Paso is known as the birthplace of the pachuco; the Mexican Americans’ original street-oriented subculture. It formed the basis for the numerous delinquent groups that would emerge there throughout the decades, ultimately producing a binational organized

Although several previous studies have advanced the knowledge of how violence perpetrated by DTOs affects electoral outcomes, the study of how levels of criminal violence vary during local electoral contests remains scant. Stated differently, we know little on whether the local electoral cycle has an effect on the level of criminal violence. Employing the CIDE-PPD Database, we find that local elections

This paper outlines research on the engagement processes and pathways into organised crime (OC). In recent years research on OC has increased, however there is still little understanding of how individuals become engaged in OC, and specifically whether differences exist in engagement patterns between certain groups of OC offenders. A content analysis was undertaken on the auto/biographies of one-hundred

The regulation and governance of labour exploitation is a well-researched area across numerous disciplines. Common approaches towards regulating labour exploitation in businesses and supply chains include state interventions to tackle organised crime via the criminal justice system. However, due to strict criminal-legal definitions, these interventions are only possible when targeting severe exploitation

While the preponderance of delineation, exploration, and analysis of human trafficking concentrates on the victimization of trafficked people, the offenders’ criminal partaking is often left unexplored. That said, this study aims to examine the conundrum of human trafficking by exploring the traffickers’ demographics, tactics, connections, and collaborations. In order to accomplish this, data are drawn

A form of criminal exploitation rarely mentioned in the academic literature has recently emerged, evolved and taken meaningful hold in the UK. Hundreds of cases of ‘cuckooing’ have been reported, where heroin and crack cocaine dealers associated with the so-called ‘County Lines’ supply methodology have taken over the homes of local residents and created outposts to facilitate their supply operations

Despite new mandates to identify and respond to labor trafficking crimes, US law enforcement struggles to integrate labor trafficking enforcement with traditional policing routines and roles. As a result, human trafficking enforcement has primarily focused on sex trafficking and few labor trafficking cases have been identified and prosecuted. This study utilizes data from 86 qualitative interviews

This article presents the results of empirical analyses of the use of information technology (IT) by organized crime groups. In particular, it explores how the use of IT affects the processes of origin and growth of criminal networks. The empirical data presented in this article consist of 30 large scale criminal investigations into organized crime, including traditional organized crime, traditional

On 10–11 October 2018, the 10th Research Conference on Organized Crime took place in The Hague. This year’s theme was Criminal Markets: The Dark Web, Money Laundering and Counterstrategies. Researchers, practitioners and policy makers gathered to discuss research results, trends and policy issues. This article looks into recent developments on the topics mentioned and gives an overview of the conference

Kinship ties play an important role in organised crime, but little attention has been paid as yet to criminal families and intergenerational transmission of delinquent behaviour as well as criminal ‘leadership.’ This paper presents the results of an in-depth study of seven families in the south of the Netherlands that produced a leader of a criminal group in at least one generation. In almost every

This article provides an introduction to the articles submitted to the special issue of Trends in Organised Crime on ‘Organised Crime in Latin America’. The aim of the special issue is to draw together novel empirical research findings and theoretical accounts on various aspects of organised crime in the particular geographic context.

While significant efforts have been made to reform the criminal justice system across Latin America, we do not know the conditions under which reform effectively deters homicide, one of many goals of the reform. Drawing on a novel sub-national design in Mexico, I find that criminal procedure reforms aimed at improving due process are not sufficient for deterring homicide in places where non-state actors

Human trafficking is an increasing field of academic research, but the obstacles of investigation and prosecution of traffickers is still under-researched. This article analyses the challenges of prosecution of criminal groups facilitating the prostitution of Hungarian women to Western European countries by focusing on international cooperation of law enforcement agencies. Although the scientific literature mostly

This essay presents an introduction to the special issue on outlaw motorcycle clubs in Europe. Apart from providing an overview of the papers contained in the special issue, it presents a classificatory scheme for the analysis of the links between outlaw biker clubs-also known as outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs)-and crime. Against the backdrop of the history of the outlaw biker subculture in Europe

The ‘reintegrative shaming’ and ‘benevolent paternalism’ models, traditionally used to describe the Japanese criminal justice system, have been periodically criticised for their orientalist approach. Nevertheless, no critique addressed the fact that these models ignored the presence of long-lasting crime syndicates, the yakuza, in Japan. Meanwhile, since 1991 the Japanese government has passed different

This paper presents a systematic review of organised crime data collection and analysis methods. It did this by reviewing all papers published in Trends in Organized Crime and Global Crime between 2004 and 2018 (N = 463). The review identified a number of key weaknesses. First, organised crime research is dominated by secondary data analysis of open-access documents, and documents are seldom subjected

This article aims to analyze the evolution of Brazilian criminal organization Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC—First Command of the Capital), especially its transformation from a group advocating human rights to a transnational violent non-state actor. Created in the late 1990s by inmates at Taubate Prison, PCC is currently a key trigger of violence in South America. Since a massive attack performed

This study is a mixed methods case study of the Fernando Sanchez Organization (FSO) better known as the Tijuana Cartel in the 2008–2010 period, aimed at better understanding internal structures and the roles of individuals in crossborder polydrug networks under pressures from rivals and state leadership targeting. In addition to historical archival data to build a qualitative case study, it uses arrest

Much of the literature on illegal labour focuses on the exploitation of illegal migrants and, by extension, the trafficking and smuggling networks that transport them to destination countries. Using evidence from two projects that investigated working conditions in the formal service economy, the paper presents evidence of ‘off the books’ work, illegal employment practices such as denial of benefits

In this article, two case studies of large-scale bid rigging in the construction industry in Canada and the Netherlands are analysed to explore why business cartels sometimes do and sometimes do not involve organised crime. By combining concepts from both organised crime and organisational crime, an integrated understanding of the organisation of serious crimes for gain is applied. Across time and

This study focuses on Italian corruption among mayors, since they are key players in the Italian institutions. Political decentralization has brought local government closer to the citizens while allowing a more direct expression of democracy on the part of mayors. In this study, we analyse the probability of mayors committing crime with i) external actors, i.e., entrepreneurs, professionals or other

Traditionally policymakers have paid little attention to the consumption of steroids and other performance and image enhancing drugs (PIEDs) in Australia. Yet, in recent times PIEDs have come to occupy an increasing amount of discursive space and, indeed, regulatory action. This newfound interest may be attributed to several broader developments, not least the perception of the involvement of organized

The original version of this article unfortunately contained a mistake.

This article deals with the policing of biker groups in Norway. It describes the two idealtypical approaches of dialogue and confrontation. It tries to explain why the police use certain methods. It finds that policing is rarely based on knowledge of what works or the causes of a problem. Instead the approaches chosen seem to reflect certain styles of policing described in cultural studies of the police

This article evaluates the effects of violence related to the operations of drug-trafficking organizations (DTOs) on electoral competition, defined by the number of electoral alternatives or candidates in Mexico’s municipal elections. I find that the killing and threatening of politicians, which are effective tools to influence politics, jeopardizes competition in violent Mexican municipalities by

While discussion on corruption in sport is intensifying and football match-fixing in particular is attracting increasing attention, new fixing scandals emerge offering new accounts of actors and corrupt practices within the football industry and the level of the external threat to the sport. The scandal exposure of fixed matches in Turkey in 2011 sheds light on the fixing of 17 matches played in the

A growing number of studies show that the advent of the Internet has transformed the organisational life of crime, with many academic and non-academic articles and reports describing various types of organisational structures involved in cybercrimes as “organised crime”. Other researchers are more critical in applying the organised crime label to cybercrimes. These debates are not merely speculative

In the wake of so-called “hardline policies” against criminal groups (persecution, militarization, strengthening of security apparatuses), we take a comprehensive approach to the study of violent territorial disputes. We offer features for studying the violence attributed to organized crime, particularly in Mexico from 2007 to 2011, a time known as the “War on Drugs”; we identify characteristics of

This paper provides an introduction to the articles and report excerpt submitted to the special issue of Trends in Organized Crime on ‘Organised crime and illegal markets in the UK and Ireland’. The aim of the special issue is to draw together empirical research findings and theoretical accounts on various manifestations of organised crime in the particular geographic context(s), the evolution of organised

This study examines the nature and community-level impact of organised crime groups known to the police in three deprived, high-crime neighbourhoods in which a wide range of organised crime was evident. By doing so, we were able to identify how the groups in these areas were structured, who was involved and how they operated. A number of key group features emerged. We describe these features to provide

This paper finds qualified support for the use of Skarbek’s (2011, 2014) governance theory to understand the emergence of prison gang-like groups in Kyrgyzstan, Northern Ireland and Brazil. However, Skarbek’s (2011, 2014) governance theory has little to say about how many prison gangs emerge and how they organise comparatively outside the US context. This paper argues that variation in the number of

The present study is an analysis of a Czech political corruption network known as the Rath affair reconstructed with publicly available data. We argue that for the study of criminal networks it is fruitful to follow a multiplex approach, i.e., to distinguish several interdependent network dimensions and study how they are interrelated. Relational elements in corruption are identified, and we propose