By Amnesty International
This report presents Amnesty International’s findings from a research trip to southern Florida in September 2025, to document the human rights impacts of federal and state migration and asylum policies on mass detention and deportation, access to due process, and detention conditions since President Trump took office on 20 January 2025. In particular, it focuses on detention conditions at the Krome North Service Processing Center (Krome) and the Everglades Detention Facility, also known as “Alligator Alcatraz”.
By José Gustavo Arocha
BOTTOM LINE UP FRONT:
1 Tren de Aragua (TdA) has morphed from a prison gang into a paramilitary instrument of the Maduro regime, now active in at least eleven Latin American countries [1] and twenty-three U.S. states, [2] according to the U.S. House Oversight Committee (2025).
2 Strategic Alignment. TdA’s deliberate expansion complements Venezuela’s Guerra de Todo el Pueblo asymmetric-warfare doctrine, [3] erasing boundaries between statecraft and organized crime.
3 Elastic Network. The gang’s “insurgent archipelago” [4] of semiautonomous cells, linked through encrypted channels, makes it exceptionally resilient; when joint Peruvian-U.S. raids freed more than eighty trafficking victims in January 2025, [5] replacement cells reemerged within days. [6]
4 Weaponized Migration. By monetizing migrant flows, selling “all risk” travel packages that often devolve into debt bondage, [7] TdA offloads costs onto regional adversaries; more than 520,000 migrants transited through the Darién Gap in 2023. [8]
5 Persistent Threat. Despite terrorism designations by the United States, Argentina, Ecuador, and Trinidad and Tobago—and nearly 3,500 U.S. arrests as of August 2025, [9] TdA’s franchise model is regenerating faster than law enforcement can dismantle it.
By Brandon Martinez, Rebecca Tublitz, Otgonjargal Okhidoi (Otgo), Emily West
The majority of people in local jails around the country are awaiting their criminal trial, meaning they have not been convicted of the crimes that brought them in, and many of them do not pose a danger to public safety. In fact, keeping those in jail who could be better served in the community can cause long-term instability.
Given this research, cities and counties involved in the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) have engaged in collaborative, multi-agency efforts to safely reduce the misuse and overuse of their local jails and increase equity across the system.
These efforts have yielded impressive results: in these SJC cities and counties, nearly 18,000 fewer people are in jails today compared to the start of the initiative.
By Jessica Pandian
Through foregrounding the circumstances of seven deaths in women’s prisons and highlighting issues which have persisted for decades, this report provides further evidence that the women’s prison estate is – and for decades has been – incapable of adequate reform. An analysis of the deaths reveals the key thematic issues, which fall under three categories: 1. not believing prisoners in crisis and at risk, 2. failings in prison processes, and 3. imprisonment as the default to social inequality. Lastly, the report provides a statistical analysis of deaths and self-harm in women’s prison from 2018 - 2024If we do not address the current prison crisis and reflect on its harmful impact, it is inevitable that more people will be exposed to the harms of the prison environment and die. This report is a blunt reminder to the Government to act now by committing to dismantle the women’s estate and halt all prison building.
This report exposes the successive failures of reforms, strategies and frameworks introduced in the policy around women’s prisons in England and Wales since the launch of the Ministry of Justice’s Female Offender Strategy in 2018.1 The strategy’s intended purpose was to improve lived conditions in women’s prisons and reduce the women’s prison population. 2018 also marks the year in which INQUEST published 'Still Dying on the Inside', 2 the third INQUEST publication providing unique insight into deaths in women’s prisons.
By Amber H. Simpler, Adam P. Natoli, William Jett & Yash A. Patade
In light of escalating concerns about the increasing number of individuals in United States' jails with mental health conditions, the current investigation sought to examine population trends in psychotropic prescription patterns in 34 jails over an 11-year epoch. Leveraging data from a largescale, multisite database derived from 1,251,837 jail detainees' electronic health records (i.e., the Repository of Electronic Archives in Correctional Healthcare, or REACH, database), General Estimating Equations (GEE) models were used to estimate population-averaged probabilities of prescriptions for any psychotropic agent and specific agent classes (e.g., antianxiety, antidepressant, antipsychotic, anticonvulsant). While GEE analysis revealed year-to-year variability, overall significant increases (i.e., > 100%) in prescription probability were observed for all agent classes from 2013 to 2023 except lithium, which declined significantly over time. Notably, the prescription probability for antipsychotic agents increased 249% during the study epoch. These findings add further evidence of the increasing mental health needs of jail populations. To better understand the increase in psychotropic prescriptions among jail detainees, additional inquiries should explore the clinical justification, therapeutic value, and impact of treatment compliance.
By Kim Barnett, Noor Butt, Rosie Allen, Pauline Goodlad, Anne Krayer, Adam O'Neill, et al.
Background: With a rising prison population, a substantial portion of whom are identified as substance misusers, it is important to understand the availability of treatment pathways, their successes and areas for improvement. Given the likelyimportance of national factors in criminal justice and substance use service provision, we chose to focus on one country.Aim: To review substance misuse treatment and outcomes for such treatments as implemented in British prisons for men.Methods: We conducted a mixed‐methods systematic review, searching Ovid MEDLINE, Ovid Embase, APA PsycINFO,CINAHL Plus, Sociology Collection, Web of Science Core Collection and Social Science Premium Collection between 1 January2000 and 5 June 2024. Included were empirical, peer‐reviewed studies of processes and outcomes of UK male prison‐basedsubstance misuse programmes. Primary outcomes included changes in substance use, withdrawal symptoms and experiencesof interventions, whereas secondary outcomes encompassed quality of life, locus of control and mental health. Because of studydesign heterogeneity, meta‐analysis was not possible. Analysis followed JBI methodology with a convergent synthesis.Results: Fourteen studies were included: 8 qualitative, 5 quantitative studies of which 3 were randomised control trials (RCTs)and 1 mixed‐methods study, with a combined sample of 4037 participants engaged in opioid substitute treatment (OST) and/orpsychosocial interventions. Four key themes emerged: the power of purposeful activity, strengthening support systems, bridgingpatient needs with treatment plans and, for those in opiate programmes, experiences and engagement with opioid substitutiontreatments.Conclusions: Participants articulated diverse treatment needs, highlighting the necessity of individualised and tailoredreduction or maintenance plans. Treatment requires a comprehensive approach with the aim of facilitating effective socialintegration.
By National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
The U.S. medicolegal death investigation system is responsible for investigating and providing determinations of cause and manner of death, playing a vital role in the nation's public health and criminal justice systems. Recent, high-profile deaths in custody cases have drawn widespread attention to the determinations of cause and manner of death made by forensic pathologists, medical examiners, and coroners, and questions have been raised about the scientific validity of such determinations.
Strengthening the U.S. Medicolegal Death Investigation System: Lessons from Deaths in Custody evaluates the handling of deaths in police custody by the medicolegal death investigation system and recommends actions to strengthen the nation's medicolegal death investigation system.
By Monika Sawicka
This paper aims to contribute to the debate on foreign policy strategies of state actors in the international system with a particular focus onpolicies pursued by far-right populist leaders. On the theoretical level,it builds on role theory and status-seeking strategies drawn from social identity theory (SIT) to offer an enhanced conceptual framework suit-able for scrutinising more radical forms of international activism. Thetheoretical points are then illustrated empirically by exposing the find-ings from content analysis of Brazilian policymakers’ speeches and their juxtaposition with the Bolsonaro government’s policies in the areas of environmental protection and regional cooperation. The author’s main claim is that President Jair Bolsonaro and his Foreign Affairs MinisterErnesto Araújo, through their rhetoric about cooperation in SouthAmerica and the Amazon and the actions undertaken by the adminis-tration in these fields, envisioned for Brazil the role of vandal. This had substantial consequences for the country’s international standing.
GEOPOLITICS, 2023, VOL. 28, NO. 2, 619–640
By Tamara Stotz, Angela Bearth, Signe Maria Ghelfi & Michael Siegrist
Due to the increasing number of passengers at airports, regular security checks reached their capacity limits. Thus, alternative security checks are being discussed to increase their efficiency. For example, instead of screening all passengers briefly, a randomly selected sample of passengers could be screened thoroughly. However, such randomization-based security checks could be perceived as less secure based on the assumption that fewer illegal objects would be uncovered than through regular security checks. To analyze whether this is the case, we conducted an online experiment that investigated people’s perceptions of and preference for traditional and randomization-based security checks from both the passenger and the criminal perspectives. The findings suggest that within security checks with explicitly stated equal probabilities of detecting illegal objects, passengers do not exhibit strong preferences for either the traditional or the randomization-based security checks. However, randomization-based security checks would be preferred by criminals. Thus, with regard to security, the status quo, namely traditional security checks, is still the best way to keep airports secure.
Journal of Risk Research, Volume 24, 2021 - Issue 12
By Rasmus Munksgaard, Kim Moeller & Theresa Dyrvig Henriksen
Sex workers in Europe are increasingly of nonnational origin. The Schengen cooperation allows internal migration within the European Union, but many migrant sex workers originate from outside the EU. While sex workers are already in precarious positions, nonnationals risk deportation, dependent on their citizenship status, and may have debts to smugglers. Consequently, they may be more likely to work longer hours to increase short-term profits. Using a dataset of sex work advertisements from one Danish website (n = 2,594), we estimate the association between inferred citizenship status and a) advertised hours on shift using ordinary least squares regression, and b) the probability of advertising 24/7 availability using a linear probability model. Compared to Danish sex workers, we find migrants advertise almost twice as many hours on shift and are more likely to advertise 24/7 availability. These results shed light on the inequalities that persist between national and nonnational sex workers.
Global Crime, Volume 26, 2025 - Issue 1
By Giulia Berlusconi
This paper investigates the impact of the targeting of key players by law enforcement on the structure, communication strategies, and activities of a drug trafficking network. Data are extracted from judicial court documents. The unique nature of the investigation – which saw a key player being arrested mid-investigation but police monitoring continuing for another year – allows to compare the network before and after targeting. This paper combines a quantitative element where network statistics and exponential random graph models are used to describe and explain structural changes over time, and a qualitative element where the content of wiretapped conversations is analysed. After law enforcement targeting, network members favoured security over efficiency, although criminal collaboration continued after the arrest of the key player. This paper contributes to the growing literature on the efficiency-security trade-off in criminal networks, and discusses policy implications for repressive policies in illegal drug markets.
Global Crime, Volume 23, 2022 - Issue 1
By Matthew Edwards,Jack Mark Whittaker, Cassandra Cross & Mark Button
The internet has revolutionised retail sales, with online shopping a common practice globally. While convenient, offenders have also embraced the opportunity to target potential victims and their shopping carts. Online shopping fraud occurs when offenders represent themselves as legitimate online sellers to gain sales from unsuspecting victims, both by impersonating genuine retailers and creating fictional retailers with non-existent products. The current article explores the victimisation and near misses of consumers to online shopping fraud. Based on survey responses of 1011 Australians, the article examines the online shopping activities of individuals as well as any victimisation or near miss experiences. The results indicate a high level of victimisation and near misses across this sample. It further examines a range of impacts experienced by these consumers and considers the implications of these results for the retail sector and prevention practices into the future.
Global Crime, 26(1), 69–89.
By Noga Shanee, Amnon Keren, Evelyn D. Anca, Tamar Fredman, Omer Polansky & Yael Cohen Paran
There are certain biases that characterize the global efforts to tackle wildlife crime, restricting their effectiveness. Firstly, wildlife crime is considered mainly a problem of developing source countries, while the role of developed consumer countries is largely ignored. Secondly, illegal trafficking and legal wildlife trade are treated separately, while the first is considered harmful to the environment and the latter is often considered tolerable, and even a conservational tool. In this study, we use the case study of Israel, a small, developed country with a solid legal framework to control the illegal wildlife trade. For the period between 2021 and 2023 we reviewed national and international laws and regulations from different sectors relevant to wildlife law enforcement. We monitored social media, online commerce platforms and instant messaging groups in order to assess online trade, and interacted with the wildlife authorities to assess their responses. We found six overarching legal themes: (1) species permitted for trade and possession; (2) trade and possession permits; (3) health permits; (4) animal welfare laws and regulations; (5) wildlife shows; and (6) general commerce and money laundering laws. Our results demonstrate that although there is a regulatory infrastructure which allows legal wildlife trade, the vast majority of the trade violates at least some of the related laws and standards. We also found biases in the authorities’ readiness to tackle different types of wildlife crime. Therefore, this study challenges the false dichotomy between legal and illegal wildlife trade and calls for further research and improved enforcement and control of authorized wildlife trade in developed countries.
Journal of International Wildlife Law & Policy, Volume 28, 2025 - Issue 1
By Fritz Brugger, Joschka J. Proksik & Felicitas Fischer
Most research on illicit financial flows (IFFs) has focused on illicit outflows from low-income countries and the role of non-state actors in generating IFFs. Less attention has been paid to processes through which IFFs enter formal value chains – in effect being legalised before leaving the country – or the crucial role of state institutions as gatekeepers. We develop a novel explanatory approach to account for the enabling role of state institutions in the legalisation of IFFs. Building on political settlement theory, we explain the performance of institutions in regulating IFFs as a function to maintain political power. Taking the case of Bolivia, we examine how legalising illicit value flows works in practice and analyse the motives and underlying conditions that lead state institutions to permit the formal export of gold shipments that have been illicitly sourced or transferred. We find that the legalisation of IFFs accommodates the interests of powerful cooperatives dominating the gold-mining sector, which are critical to maintaining the political settlement on which the incumbent government’s power is based. By maintaining a status quo of non-enforcement, legal ambiguity, and informality, gold-mining cooperatives reap higher benefits from resource extraction at the expense of domestic revenue mobilisation.
New Political Economy, Volume 29, 2024 - Issue 4
By Caroline Shubel , Mary Ava Nunnery , Grace Marley, Bayla Ostrach , Delesha M. Carpenter
Background: Methadone, an evidence-based medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD), is available through prescription at community pharmacies in countries like Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom, but not in the United States (U.S.). The objective of this scoping review was to summarize barriers and facilitators related to dispensing methadone in community pharmacies to inform future implementation efforts in the U.S. Methods: A scoping review was conducted using PubMed, Embase, SCOPUS, and CINAHL. Original research articles related to barriers and/or facilitators around community pharmacy-based methadone dispensing were included. No search limits (year of publication, geographic boundaries) were applied to the search strategy. Two independent researchers screened all articles for eligibility, extracted data, and met to reach consensus. Data were extracted on 12 items, with a particular focus on barriers and facilitators to dispensing methadone in community pharmacies. Results: Forty-one articles were included in the review. The most common barriers to methadone dispensing were workload (n = 14), safety concerns for staff and property (n = 13), concern about patient behavior and interactions (n = 12), financial hardship (for pharmacists and patients) (n = 11), and stigma and discrimination towards patients (n = 11). The most common facilitators were pharmacist training and education (n = 14), positive pharmacist-patient relationships (n = 14), and privacy (n = 10). Conclusions: The findings from this review can be used to address barriers and incorporate known facilitators into future protocols or practice of pharmacy-based methadone dispensing. Further research is needed to identify U.S. and state-specific anticipated needs for pharmacy-based methadone dispensing
:Drug Alcohol Depend Rep. 2026 Jan 29;18:100413. doi: 10.1016/j.dadr.2026.100413. PMID: 41695144; PMCID: PMC12906019
By Andrew P. Bontemps, Elizabeth S. Hawes, Bailey E. Pridgen, William P. Wagner, Dominique Black, Karen L. Cropsey
Background:Cannabis use has increased in the United States as legalization has spread. While Δ-9 THC remains the most-used federally illegal substance, use of other psychoactive hemp-derived products (Δ-8 THC, Δ-10 THC, HHC, THC-O) has grown. The current study investigated patterns of cannabis use and perceptions of harm and benefit of cannabis across states with differing cannabis laws.
Method
Participants (N=639) were adults endorsing past-90-day cannabis use who lived in one of 15 states selected based on cannabis laws (recreational use, medical use, illegal). Participants completed self-report questionnaires endorsing types of cannabis used, methods of consuming and acquiring cannabis, and ranking of potential harm and benefit of consumption methods.
Results
The majority (N=573; 89.7% of participants) endorsed past-30-day use of Δ-9 THC, regardless of legal status. There was significantly greater use of alternate cannabis forms in states where Δ-9 THC remains illegal (past-90-day: χ2(2)=16.78, p<.001; past-30-day: χ2(2)=9.50, p=.009). Individuals from states with legal recreational cannabis most frequently purchased cannabis legally (52.0%), but high levels of non-legal purchase existed regardless of legal status (47.5%). Participants reported primarily consuming Δ-9 THC through smoking (86.1%), CBD through ingestion (50.5%), and alternative cannabis types through vaping (43.8-57.7%). Average harm rankings were lower for smoking if it was the primary method of consumption.
Conclusions
Individuals purchased and consumed cannabis regardless of legal status and legal status was not significantly associated with harm or benefit rating, controlling for demographic and use data. Individuals appear more likely to purchase through legal means, if available.
Drug and Alcohol Dependence Reports
Available online 14 March 2026, 100431
Bt Hope M. Smiley-McDonald, Esther O. Chung , Lynn D. Wenger, Danielle Good , Gillian Leichtling c, Barrot H. Lambdin , Alex H. Kral
Background
In 2020, the U.S. state of Oregon passed Measure 110 (M110), which aimed to address substance use disorder as a public health issue and reduce disparities in the criminal legal system by decriminalizing personal drug possession and increasing services. The impact of partial drug decriminalization on individuals under community supervision—whose release conditions often prohibit drug use and who M110 excluded—is understudied.
Methods
We used targeted sampling to recruit and survey people who use drugs (PWUD; N=468) in eight Oregon counties in 2023. We compared PWUD under community supervision to those who were not to assess opioid-related overdose, naloxone access, and law enforcement engagement.
Results
Compared to PWUD who were not under community supervision, those under supervision had higher prevalence of past year opioid-related overdose. There were no differences by naloxone access. Eighty-two percent (82%) of PWUD on community supervision were stopped by law enforcement in the past year. PWUD on community supervision were more likely than those not on community supervision to report in the past year being searched by law enforcement at least once (adjusted prevalence differences [APD]=0.33; 95% CI: 0.23, 0.43), spent time in jail at least once (APD=0.33; 95% CI: 0.23, 0.43), and to have concerns about getting into trouble if they called 911 for a drug-related health problem (APD=0.12; 95% CI: 0.00, 0.18).
Conclusion
Under M110, Oregon PWUD experienced more police engagement and overdoses. Findings have implications for less police presence at overdose scenes, greater access to naloxone and support services, and protections under future decriminalization laws.
Drug and Alcohol Dependence Reports
Available online 15 March 2026, 100430
In Press, Journal Pre-proof
By Lisa N. Sacco, Joanna R. Lampe, Hassan Z. Sheikh
Marijuana is a psychoactive drug that generally consists of leaves and flowers of the cannabis sativa plant. It is a Schedule I controlled substance under the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA; 21 U.S.C. §§801 et seq.), and thus is strictly regulated by federal authorities. In contrast, over the last several decades, most states and territories have deviated from a comprehensive prohibition of marijuana and have laws and policies allowing for some cultivation, sale, distribution, and possession of marijuana.
Marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug in the United States. According to data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), in 2024 an estimated 64.2 million individuals aged 12 or older used marijuana in the past year, and 44.3 million reported using it in the past month. The percentage of individuals 12 or older who reported past-month marijuana use gradually increased from 6.1% in 2008 to 15.4% in 2024—a time frame during which a majority of states repealed state criminal prohibitions on marijuana and allowed for its recreational and/or medical use. The rate of past-month marijuana use among youth (ages 12-17) was 6.0% in 2024 and since 2008 has fluctuated from a low of 6.0% (in 2023 and 2024) to a high of 7.9% (in 2011), while adult (ages 18+) use steadily increased—from 6.3% in 2008 to 16.3% in 2024.
Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service; March 10, 2026.
By Matthew F. Garnett, Jodi A. Cisewski, Farida B. Ahmad
Objective:
This report identifies the specific drugs most frequently involved in drug overdose deaths in the United States from 2017 through 2023.
Methods:
Data from the 2017–2023 National Vital Statistics System mortality files were linked to literal text data from death certificates. Drug overdose deaths were identified using the International Classification of Diseases, 10th Revision underlying cause-of-death codes X40–X44, X60–X64, X85, and Y10–Y14. Specific drugs were identified by searching three literal text fields of the death certificate: the causes of death from Part I, significant conditions contributing to death from Part II, and the description of how the injury occurred. Contextual information was used to determine drug involvement in the death. Descriptive statistics were calculated for the most frequently mentioned drugs involved in drug overdose deaths. Deaths involving multiple drugs were counted in all relevant drug categories.
Results:
Among drug overdose deaths with mention of at least one specific drug, the most frequently mentioned drugs during 2017–2023 included: fentanyl, heroin, oxycodone, morphine, methadone, hydrocodone, alprazolam, diphenhydramine, cocaine, methamphetamine, amphetamine, gabapentin, and xylazine. Fentanyl ranked first across all years and was the most common concomitant drug found with other top drugs, ranging from 99.0% of xylazine-involved drug overdose deaths to 48.3% of oxycodone-involved drug overdose deaths. Cocaine and methamphetamine were also frequent concomitant drugs. Trends in age-adjusted rates across the 2017 to 2023 period varied by drug, but notably the rate for heroin-involved deaths sharply declined, while the rate for fentanyl-involved deaths increased and then stabilized between 2022 and 2023. In 2023, the most frequently mentioned drugs in unintentional drug overdose deaths were fentanyl, methamphetamine, and cocaine, while the most frequently mentioned drugs for suicide-related drug overdoses were diphenhydramine, oxycodone, and bupropion.
Conclusions:
This report identifies patterns in the specific drugs most frequently involved in drug overdose deaths from 2017 through 2023.National Vital Statistics Reports; CDC National Center for Health Statistics; 2026.
By lBenedikt Fischer, Didier Jutras-Aswad, Bernard Le Foll, Daniel T. Myra
Highlights
•
The province of British Columbia (Canada) temporarily implemented a decriminalization initiative for personal drug possession/use (2023–2024) in contexts of a toxic drug death crisis.
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The decriminalization initiative was a priori promoted as a “tool to end the overdose crisis” and widely expected to reduce adverse health outcomes from toxic drug use.
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Emerging evaluation data indicate that the drug decriminalization initiative was not associated with population-level changes in drug use-related mortality (e.g., overdose deaths) or morbidity (e.g., hospitalizations).
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Drug use decriminalization remains an essential step to align prohibition-based drug policy frameworks with public health and human rights principles, but must be approached realistically and designed sensibly.
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To tangibly address toxic drug use-related harms, expanded measures are required that are effectively capable of preventing and reducing PWUDs’ exposure to and use of toxic drugs
International Journal of Drug Policy
Volume 150, April 2026, 105181