By: Ghaleb Krame, Amanda Davies, Magdalena García & Noé Cuervo Vázquez 

This paper explores the power struggle between the Chapitos and Mayiza factions of the Sinaloa Cartel and its implications for U.S. and Mexican law enforcement. Employing scenario analysis, payoff matrices, and Nash equilibria, the study evaluates potential outcomes of this conflict and their impact on cartel power dynamics. While the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG) is poised to exploit instability and expand its influence over fentanyl trafficking and key territories, for the United States of America (U.S.A.), this internal fragmentation complicates efforts to control the opioid crisis. In Mexico, Omar García Harfuch faces the challenge of stabilizing cartel-affected regions and countering CJNG’s growth. A Mayiza victory is seen as the most favorable outcome, reducing violence and curbing CJNG’s expansion. Coordinated intelligence-sharing and strategic responses are essential for regional stability.

Security Journal (2025) 38:57

By  Maia Sacchetto

  Premising that there are more flexible forms of Nigerian crime, such as small and scattered groups not in connection with each other that operate mainly as drug dealers of small districts in the suburbs of northern Italy, this research focuses on the most structured forms of criminal organizations, those directly descended from the cultist circles born in Nigeria in the '60s and resulted in real mafia associations already in the motherland and then extended throughout Europe. The choice of this theme and this very specific category of Nigerian organized crime is based on the belief that well-structured and organized groups are more dangerous and difficult to counter for three reasons basically: the first is that it is rarer for associates to decide to betray the group to favor information to the police or intelligence. This is because of the closer ties between group members (and in this case this element takes on an even more incisive relevance since the subject is an ethnically based organized mafia in which ethniccultural ties provide the basis for interaction between associates), but also and especially because of the coercive and intimidating forces between members of mafia associations towards the ones prone to cheat on the group; the second is developed from the assumption that a more sophisticated internal structure of the association also corresponds to more elaborate modus operandi and operational strategies that allow prosecutors of illicit activities to camouflage or hide the proceeds of illicit activities; the third reason is closely related to the first and second and consists in the fact that mafia associations that are highly organized and capable of taking advantage of substantial material resources are also more likely to act in a capillary, widespread, large-scale and sprawling manner to the point of infiltrating the legal economy. As will be described in the first chapter of this research, the Black Mafia originated in Nigeria as a protest movement against constituted power and composed mainly of members of Nigeria's leading universities. Over time it expanded, heightened the violence of its manifestations, and began to move out of the realm of mere ideological rebellion by directly affecting public institutions. In a short time, the cults turned into full-fledged clans and began to act in Nigeria as the Italian mafia acts in Italy, intimidating political and economic opponents who would stand between their illicit activities and the achievement of their goals: the accumulation of wealth and power. From the outset, these associations are thus characterized by a high degree of pervasiveness in the political, social and economic structure of their country, as well as multifacetedness by dealing with a massive and varied range of illicit activities, including support in the arms trafficking of terrorist groups such as Boko Haram. With the conclusion of the Cold War, the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and restrictions in the mobility of people, and the emergence of the new globalized and interconnected world, the Black Mafia, which had already shown a remarkable predisposition to expand and sprawl, crossed its national borders. Following a progressive evolution, it has developed into a form of transnational organized crime which according to the UNODC represents the main threat to the security and political and economic stability of states (UNODC, 2006)1 . Undergoing continuous metamorphosis and adapting immediately to the changing needs of the market and globalization, it has then become increasingly sophisticated and pervasive (UNODC, 2018)2 . Out of sheer opportunism, it started allying itself with other forms of crime in order to strengthen its organization and to extend to more and more operators: drug traffickers, arms traffickers, human traffickers, up to encompassing operators that act daily in a regime of legality, all in order to increase their revenues 

By Corentin Cohen

This article looks at the discourses regarding Nigerian confraternities’ expansion to Europe. It analyses how networks of individuals working together for solidarity, economic or political objectives became categorized as organised crime or as a mafia. I use original data and police investigations, interviews with members and victims, judges, police officers, and journalists to show how the work of French and Italian institutions led to the emergence and transformation of discourses regarding the “Nigerian mafia” which, in the context of the 2015 migration crisis, came to designate confraternities. The circulation of these categories and frames cannot only be accounted for by the work of state institutions, but needs to be analysed through the sociology of information production and practices, which explains the effects of circular reporting, imposition of frames and narratives coming directly from investigations on criminal issues instead of other approaches to Nigerian migration.

Trends Organ Crim 26, 340–357 (2023

By The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized CrimeGlobal Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime,Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime,

Online illegal wildlife trade (IWT) continues to expand across social media and e-commerce platforms, with 13,254 wildlife advertisements detected between April 2024 and August 2025 across Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Middle East. Our monitoring shows a persistent concentration on Facebook, which accounts for 83.8% of all detections, alongside growing activity on e-commerce and business-to-business platforms. The rise in both volume and geographic coverage underscores how sellers exploit online environments, regulatory loopholes and shifting demand to reach consumers and adapt rapidly to enforcement efforts.

Drawing on structured monitoring by ten regional data hubs, this new iteration of the Global Trend Report highlights how species, platforms and market drivers differ widely across regions. Mammals dominate detections, led by elephants, big cats and African grey parrots, and many adverts involve species listed under CITES Appendix I or II without accompanying permit information. Hubs recorded diverse tactics: Facebook Stories designed for 24-hour visibility, coded emojis in Colombia, claims of official registration in Mexico, children’s YouTube channels in South Asia that normalize protected wildlife as pets, and loopholes around legally owned lions in Thailand.

A central focus of the report is North Korea’s Angong Niuhuang Wan (ANW) pills, whose packaging explicitly lists “rhinoceros horn” as an ingredient. Open-source intelligence shows these pills are produced in Pyongyang and moved through Sinuiju and Namyang into China before circulating across markets in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar. Embedding small amounts of rhino horn into labelled traditional medicine significantly amplifies value and demand, while illustrating how the rhino horn trade intersects with conservation and security concerns, including sanctions evasion and illicit revenue streams linked to North Korean entities.

The report also documents how markets pivot when supply declines or regulations tighten. After all pangolin species were uplisted to CITES Appendix I in 2016, Mexican export data shows an exponential rise in pirarucu leather exports, with pirarucu now positioned as a visually similar substitute. Online markets show mislabelled and misidentified leathers, such as pirarucu sold as pangolin and vice versa, revealing laundering risks along supply chains. Traceability gaps, especially once skins are processed, make verification difficult and complicate enforcement.

Taxidermy and leatherworking form another blind spot. In Mexico, highly active social-media groups advertise mounted specimens, ivory figurines and worked products derived from rhinos, elephants, manta rays, crocodilians, jaguars, pangolins, pirarucu and primates. Adverts frequently lack documentation, rely on coded language and misspellings, and exploit enforcement priorities that remain focused on live trade rather than processed parts.

Finally, declining availability of tiger products has driven substitutions such as lion canines in Thai amulet Facebook groups and jaguar parts sourced from Latin America. Cross-border movements of lion bones and skeletons, and online offers for jaguar skins, teeth and paste show how big-cat parts circulate as substitutes, shaped by availability and legal risk.

Across all hubs and product types, the report demonstrates how online IWT can be linked to global security and sanctions evasion issues, and how it adapts through substitutions, processed wildlife products and regulatory loopholes, reinforcing the need for coordinated monitoring, enforcement and policy responses.

Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2025. 35p.

By Jemar R. Bather, Diana Silver, Brendan P. Gill, Adrian Harris, Jin Yung Bae, Nina S. Parikh & Melody S. Goodman 

Background

Social vulnerability may play a role in social media-involved crime, but few studies have investigated this issue. We investigated associations between social vulnerability and social media-involved violent crimes.

Methods

We analyzed 22,801 violent crimes occurring between 2018 and 2023 in Prince George’s County, Maryland. Social media involvement was obtained from crime reports at the Prince George’s County Police Department. Social media application types included social networking, advertising/selling, ridesharing, dating, image/video hosting, mobile payment, instant messaging/Voice over Internet Protocol, and other. We used the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Social Vulnerability Index to assess socioeconomic status (SES), household characteristics, racial and ethnic minority status, housing type and transportation, and overall vulnerability. Modified Poisson models estimated adjusted prevalence ratios (aPRs) among the overall sample and stratified by crime type (assault and homicide, robbery, and sexual offense). Covariates included year and crime type.

Results

Relative to high tertile areas, we observed a higher prevalence of social media-involved violent crimes in areas with low SES vulnerability (aPR: 1.82, 95% CI: 1.37-2.43), low housing type and transportation vulnerability (aPR: 1.53, 95% CI: 1.17-2.02), and low overall vulnerability (aPR: 1.63, 95% CI: 1.23-2.17). Low SES vulnerability areas were significantly associated with higher prevalences of social media-involved assaults and homicides (aPR: 1.64, 95% CI: 1.02-2.62), robberies (aPR: 2.00, 95% CI: 1.28-3.12), and sexual offenses (aPR: 2.07, 95% CI: 1.02-4.19) compared to high SES vulnerability areas. Low housing type and transportation vulnerability (vs. high) was significantly associated with a higher prevalence of social media-involved robberies (aPR: 1.54, 95% CI:1.01-2.37). Modified Poisson models also indicated that low overall vulnerability areas had higher prevalences of social media-involved robberies (aPR: 1.71, 95% CI: 1.10-2.67) and sexual offenses (aPR: 2.14, 95% CI: 1.05-4.39) than high overall vulnerability areas.

Conclusions

We quantified the prevalence of social media-involved violent crimes across social vulnerability levels. These insights underscore the need for collecting incident-based social media involvement in crime reports among law enforcement agencies across the United States and internationally. Comprehensive data collection at the national and international levels provides the capacity to elucidate the relationships between neighborhoods, social media, and population health.

Inj. Epidemiol. 11, 54 (2024

By Eduard Ballesté-Isern & Carles Feixa 

This paper is based on an ethnographic study of the arrests and the subsequent trial and sentencing of a group of Latin Kings and Queens from Barcelona between 2015 and 2020. We analyze the actions carried out by the police, judicial institutions and media to reestablish the “hard handed” discourse in relation to these youth street groups in a time of crisis and precariousness. The concept of a “space of youth street groups” is used to construct a tool for mapping the agents who interact with these groups and the position they occupy in the social space. The interactions between these agents in Barcelona configure a new form of security governance through the creation of subjective insecurity and the promotion of punitive policies against youth street groups.

Crit Crim 30, 741–756 (2022)

By Eric Hershberg, Edward Maguire, Steven Dudley

In October 2012, the U.S. government designated MS-13 as a transnational criminal organization (TCO), raising serious questions about the breadth of the gang’s criminal capacity. Some analysts have pointed to a steady growth and professionalization of this criminal organization, but insufficient data has hindered the formulation and implementation of policies aimed at countering this trend. Our multiyear project proposed to fill gaps in the extant literature by conducting qualitative and quantitative research designed to assess MS-13’s transnational criminal capacity. More specifically, our objectives were to: 1) conduct extensive interviews with local stakeholders, gang experts, and MS-13 members in three major metropolitan areas, including two in the U.S. and one in El Salvador; 2) analyze qualitative and quantitative data gathered through tested survey and interview instruments and from official sources, with particular attention to the following factors: type of criminal activities, organizational structure, inter- and intra-gang relationships, level of community penetration, accumulation of social capital, development and migration patterns, and recruitment strategies; 3) utilize social network analysis techniques to quantify the social reach of gang member respondents; and 4) disseminate project findings to relevant constituencies in law enforcement, policymaking circles, academe, and the general public. The purpose of our research was to provide policymakers and law enforcement officials with a comprehensive understanding of MS-13 by measuring the extent and range of the organization’s criminal activity and mapping its social networks. Our goal was to generate empirical data that could serve as a foundation upon which to shape new policies and practices. Specifically, our hope was that the data would provide insights regarding the optimal allocation of law enforcement resources, the likely movements of MS-13, and the design of intervention and suppression strategies. 

Washington DC: U..S. Department of Justice,  2019. 11p.

By Raúl Zepeda Gil

Violence rising in Latin America since the early 1990s has puzzled media, policymakers and academia. Characterising high scales of violence in non-political confrontations has been one of the main challenges. The main argument of this essay is that the hybrid criminal nature of violence in Latin America by non-state organisations has pushed the discussion to several misinterpretations and conceptual stretching that produces fog rather than clarity. Instead, this essay proposes a concept of criminal war that can capture the complex nature of violence in Latin America by drawing convergences and divergences from diverse fields of literature and confronting usual mischaracterisations in current Latin American research.

Third World QuarTerly, 2023, Vol. 44, No. 4, 776–794

By : M. Richardson, M. Newman, G. Berry, C. Stansfield, A. Coombe & J. Hodgkinson

• Objective

  To identify and map evaluations of interventions on gang violence using innovative systematic review methods to inform future research needs.

  Methods

  A previous iteration of this map (Hodgkinson et al., (2009). “Reducing gang-related crime: A systematic review of ‘comprehensive’ interventions.”) was updated in 2021/22 with inclusion of evaluations since the original searches in 2006. Innovative automatic searching and screening was used concurrently with a ‘conventional’ strategy that utilised 58 databases and other online resources. Data were presented in an online interactive evidence gap map.

  Results

  Two hundred and forty-eight evaluations were described, including 114 controlled studies, characterised as comprehensive interventions, encompassing more than one distinct type of intervention.

  Conclusion

  This suggests a substantial body of previously unidentified robust evidence on interventions that could be synthesised to inform policy and practice decision-making. Further research is needed to investigate the extent to which using automated methodologies can improve the efficiency and quality of systematic reviews.

•  J Exp Criminol 20, 1125–1146 (2024).

By  Lucia Bird | Saša Đorđević | Fatjona Mejdini 

Western Balkans criminal groups, comprising both Albanian- and Slavic-speaking networks, have become dominant players in the global cocaine trade. While their influence in Europe and Latin America has been well documented, their growing role in West Africa has largely flown under the radar. Since 2019, these groups have expanded their operations in West Africa, using the region as a critical logistical, storage and redistribution hub for cocaine shipments en route to European consumption markets and beyond. This expansion has been shaped by their effective leverage of geography, governance weaknesses and infrastructure, both hard and digital. Initially limited to occasional trafficking links, the Western Balkan groups have deepened their presence across West Africa’s coastal states, including Senegal, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Guinea-Bissau and Cabo Verde. This growing focus on West Africa was driven by rising demand for cocaine in Europe, increased enforcement on direct routes to Europe and strengthened partnerships with Latin American cartels, especially Brazil’s Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC). Western Balkan groups now operate through multiple trafficking methods in West Africa, exploiting fully containerized routes, non-containerized shipments (i.e. shipments not stored in containers, but hidden elsewhere on vessels) by other types of vessels, trans-shipments at sea and in-region containerization to conceal the cocaine’s origin. They have embedded brokers in West African countries who organize logistics, establish infrastructure and liaise with local actors. In Sierra Leone, for example, they have reportedly established companies to launder funds and warehouses to store and repackage cocaine, coordinating onward shipments through formal seaports using legitimate cargo. These brokers are key to operations and are often shared among the different groups. The groups’ structures are flexible and typically consist of small, trusted units supported by collaborators. Groups leverage local vulnerabilities to build relationships with corrupt law enforcement, port operators and security services. Particularly significant Western Balkan groups in West Africa include the Montenegrin Kavač clan and its rival, the Škaljari clan. The Kavač clan’s operations have been linked to ports in Brazil and Sierra Leone, with brokers overseeing logistics from Freetown. As we explain in this report, in some cases a single broker will work with more than one group from the Western Balkans. In parallel, Albanian-speaking groups, which have a strong presence in Spain and Brazil, have been operating through countries including Senegal and Gambia, sometimes collaborating with the Italian ‘Ndrangheta or the PCC. The example of an Albanian national who, according to Brazilian law enforcement investigations, is a major European supplier coordinating shipments through West Africa from Brazil, exemplifies the growing use of multi-tonne cocaine operations routed through the Gulf of Guinea. Looking ahead, Western Balkan groups are likely to further entrench themselves in West Africa, gradually relying less on their alliances with the ‘Ndrangheta, the PCC and other Western Balkan groups and instead investing directly in infrastructure and protection mechanisms. As in Latin America, their growing presence is likely to be accompanied by deeper corruption, potential violence and fragmentation into more autonomous cells. To address the growing role of Western Balkan criminal groups in West Africa, a coordinated response should focus on three key pillars. First, strategic cross-continental partnerships should be built with law enforcement, port authorities and international actors, underpinned by a political-economy analysis, to strengthen cooperation and to identify aligned priorities. Second, an enhanced data picture, drawing on a wider range of formal and informal sources, is needed to map trafficking routes and financial flows more effectively and to empower regional and international actors to tailor their risk assessments of specific routes, to profile criminal actors and to develop viable strategies for detection and disruption. Third, smart targeting strategies that prioritize brokers should be adopted, supported by parallel financial and criminal investigations. 

Geneva:  Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime   2025. 61p.

By C. Proffit

Twenty-five years ago, Krivo and Peterson wrote a seminal piece on the context of disadvantage and its threshold effects. In The Structural Context of Homicide: Accounting for Racial Differences in the Process, they emphasize that extreme contexts of disadvantage may diminish the significance of certain structural conditions that contribute to higher crime rates, particularly in relation to homicide. However, remarkably few studies consider the threshold effects of disadvantage when studying homicide. Although their research primarily focuses on race groups and the varying degree of disadvantage as a crime-generating condition, the unequal distribution of disadvantage in communities may have unique effects on certain forms of violence, particularly gang homicide. This study will (1) explore how community predictors of gang homicide differ across contexts by comparing neighborhoods with extreme levels of disadvantage to those with low-moderate levels of disadvantage and (2) examine differences in this context of disadvantage between gang-related and nongang-related homicide to assess if differences emerge between these categorizations of lethal violence. Findings reaffirmed Krivo and Peterson’s conclusion. Disadvantage was associated with increases in gang homicide only in low to moderately disadvantaged areas while effects diminished in extremely disadvantaged communities.

  American Journal of Criminal Justice , July 2025

By Ana Muñiz

Through an analysis of interviews with Southern California attorneys, supplemented by archival materials, this article contributes to the literature on gangs, critical criminology, and Gothic tropes by examining how the ambiguous nature of gang profiling allows state actors to target racialized others in various legal and administrative venues with little evidence and few procedural protections. I conceptualize gang phantasmagoria as the constant, amorphous, unpredictable, and haunting threat of racialized gang allegations and argue that the dynamic shapes the work of legal practitioners and constitutes a state mechanism of racial terror. Specifically, first I argue that government officials deploy the specter of gangs to both portray asylum seekers as monstrous threats and justify restrictions in asylum eligibility. I then illustrate how the potential for gang phantasmagoria to upend asylum applications and trigger the deportation of their clients elicits constant low-grade anxiety for attorneys. Consequently, attorneys are forced to adopt more cautious approaches to legal work in a way that indirectly facilitates the social control of young Latinx immigrants.

Critical Criminology, olume 30, pages 159–175, (2022

By The International Crisis Group

  Principal Findings : What’s new? In President Nayib Bukele’s first year in office, El Salvador has seen a sharp drop in what long were sky-high murder rates. While the public celebrates his well-known “iron fist” policies, the reasons for success might lie in quiet, informal understandings between gangs and the government. Why does it matter? It is a major feat to reduce killings by the three main gangs in one of the world’s most violent countries. But the precise causes of the decline are complex and often unclear. Recent outbreaks of gang violence and political mudslinging underline the fragility and reversibility of this achievement. What should be done? Sustaining violence reduction is key. The government should prioritise community-focused development, rehabilitation of jailed gang members and more sophisticated policing efforts, including internal checks on security forces. Should gangs keep violence down and cooperate with authorities during the pandemic, Bukele should consider opening channels for local dialogue with them.   

  After decades of harrowing gang crime, homicides have plunged in El Salvador on the watch of the new president, Nayib Bukele. Faced with the growth of the MS-13 and 18th Street gangs, previous governments resorted to “iron fist” policies to crush them, only to find these fuelled a backlash. Since his 2019 election, President Bukele, a self-styled outsider, has won huge public support by presiding over a 60 per cent fall in murders. Yet prospects that this achievement will endure are in doubt. The collapsing homicide rate may stem not only from the government’s public security policies, but also from the gangs’ own decision to curb bloodshed, possibly due to a fragile non-aggression deal with authorities. In addition, Bukele’s confrontational style, which has been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic, risks entangling his security reforms in political battles. Broadly backed efforts to support affected communities, assist members wishing to leave gangs and encourage local peacebuilding are more likely to end definitively El Salvador’s cycle of violence. The Bukele administration argues that the plummeting murder rate – with daily killings now standing at their lowest rate since the end of the country’s civil war (1980- 1992) – represents the crowning achievement of a new security strategy. In theory, the government’s Territorial Control Plan couples robust law enforcement with violence prevention schemes. It has reinforced joint police and military patrols in 22 municipalities suffering high rates of crime, while toughening confinement measures in jails in a bid to sever communications between inmates and the outside world. At the same time, the government’s goal of building dozens of “cubes” – glass-walled recreational and education centres – represents the flagship effort to brighten the lives of young people growing up under gang dominion and prevent recruitment into their ranks. The precise reasons for the nationwide drop in homicides are hard to pin down. Statistical studies show that the Territorial Control Plan is most likely not the sole cause; specific local falls in murder rates do not correspond precisely to those areas where the plan has been implemented. Instead, in large part, gangs appear to have themselves decided to scale back their use of lethal violence. Unassailable control over communities, declining gang rivalry and increasingly autonomous gang leadership outside jails may explain this decision more than the Territorial Control Plan. Yet other government policies might have played a role: numerous analysts and local activists ascribe the gangs’ move to an informal understanding between them and the authorities, who have allegedly ordered security forces to dial back their clashes with these groups. A sudden killing spree attributed to MS-13 in April illustrated just how precarious the gangs’ commitment to reducing violence can be. Bukele’s reaction to the attacks, which left over 80 dead in a five-day span, reaffirmed his inclination to adopt punitive measures to force gangs into submission. Images shared around the world from inside El Salvador’s high-security jails revealed inmates huddled together or forced into shared cells without any access to daylight. Although murder rates have since fallen again, the risk remains that gangs, now short of extortion income due to lockdown measures and indignant at the government’s crackdown, will once again resort to extreme violence.  

  Crisis Group Latin America Report N°81, 8 July 2020  

Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2020. 46p.

By The International Crisis Group

Born of Port-au-Prince’s most powerful gangs, Viv Ansanm has raised the criminal threat overhanging Haiti’s state and civilians to alarming heights. The gang coalition announced itself to the world by besieging the Haitian capital in early 2024, triggering former Prime Minister Ariel Henry’s resignation. After consolidating its hold on much of the city, Viv Ansanm has expanded into neighbouring departments, tightened its grip on the main roads connecting Port-au-Prince to the rest of the country and mounted attacks on the airport, essentially cutting Haiti off. Gangs’ violent offensives have killed over 16,000 people since 2022. But a rising death toll and diversifying criminal portfolio, now including extortion, piracy and drug trafficking, have not stopped gangs from claiming to represent the country’s downtrodden, especially on social media. UN approval of a new foreign force to combat the gangs could shift the balance of power. But it is vital that plans are in place not just to overpower the gangs but also to persuade them to demobilise. Haitian business and political elites have relied on paramilitary forces to protect their interests since the 1950s dictatorship of Francois Duvalier, or “Papa Doc”. But in the wake of the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in July 2021, gangs have mutated, evolving from tools in the hands of the most powerful to overlords of Haiti. Two main gang groupings – the G-9, whose most public figure was Jimmy Chérizier, alias Barbecue, and the Gpèp, under Gabriel Jean Pierre, known as “Ti Gabriel” – fought for supremacy after Moïse’s murder. Even as the two faced off, gang leaders discussed whether to strike agreements to scale down the death toll among their members and spare resources. Mediators managed to craft several pacts among local groups to divvy up coveted turf. Late in 2023, reports emerged that the country’s two main gang coalitions had merged into one platform; their first joint offensive began months later replace the current transitional government. The concrete result they aspire to is a general amnesty for leaders and members. Haiti and its foreign partners are looking to beef up their ability to respond to the gangs with force. The UN Security Council has approved a new security operation, dubbed the Gang Suppression Force, to replace the Kenya-led Multinational Security Support Mission, which started up in 2024 but has never had the personnel or resources needed to check the gangs. The new force aims to incorporate 5,500 military personnel and expects to draw on reliable funding. Its mandate appears to give it more operational independence and the leeway to adopt more aggressive tactics. But until the force’s deployment, which is expected to commence around April 2026, Haiti’s authorities will have to turn to other methods. A task force, led by Haiti’s prime minister and powered by U.S. private military companies, has already used drones to hit gang members in their urban strongholds, killing over 200 people. Foreign partners are also providing training to the newly reconstituted army. Meanwhile, citizens exhausted by the threat to their neighbourhoods have established self-defence groups, provoking a brutal riposte from the gangs. Alongside its violent expansion, Viv Ansanm has sought to transform its public profile from that of a predatory criminal force into that of an ideological crusader. Crime bosses say their mission is to protect the poorest Haitians from rapacious elites and colonial powers that historically have oppressed this black Caribbean nation. Chérizier and other gang leaders have even announced the creation of a new political party, albeit without taking the steps needed to register it formally. While continuing to enrich themselves at the expense of Haitians rich and poor, their message has nevertheless become more overtly political: they appear intent on guaranteeing that their allies are part of the next administration, which should be formed by 7 February 2026 toreplace the current transitional government. The concrete result they aspire to is a general amnesty for leaders and members. Haiti and its foreign partners are looking to beef up their ability to respond to the gangs with force. The UN Security Council has approved a new security operation, dubbed the Gang Suppression Force, to replace the Kenya-led Multinational Security Support Mission, which started up in 2024 but has never had the personnel or resources needed to check the gangs. The new force aims to incorporate 5,500 military personnel and expects to draw on reliable funding. Its mandate appears to give it more operational independence and the leeway to adopt more aggressive tactics. But until the force’s deployment, which is expected to commence around April 2026, Haiti’s authorities will have to turn to other methods. A task force, led by Haiti’s prime minister and powered by U.S. private military companies, has already used drones to hit gang members in their urban strongholds, killing over 200 people. Foreign partners are also providing training to the newly reconstituted army. Meanwhile, citizens exhausted by the threat to their neighbourhoods have established self-defence groups, provoking a brutal riposte from the gangs. A well-resourced, properly informed and expertly commanded Gang Suppression Force could help change the balance of force on the ground and push the gangs onto the back foot. Port-au-Prince and its foreign counterparts, however, must take care to mitigate the dangers of civilian casualties and violations of human rights, ensuring that robust accountability systems are in place. Once the force is up and running, the Haitian government should also overcome the coordination failures that have plagued previous security campaigns. In particular, the government should appoint members to the National Security Council and ask them to design a strategy that lays out each institution’s role in fighting the gangs. Even so, it remains unlikely that force aone will entirely extricate gangs from the communities they control or sever the nexus with politics that has bedevilled Haiti for over half a century. Though informal negotiations with gangs take place on a regular basis – to gain access to people in need of humanitarian aid or to keep businesses open – many Haitians oppose the idea of formal dialogue with the perpetrators of crimes they consider unforgivable. Government officials have correctly said the Haitian state cannot engage in talks from a position of weakness. But if the new multinational force and revamped Haitian security forces allow the authorities to gain the upper hand and broadcast their armed superiority, state officials should look to use dialogue as a means of convincing the gangs to cut their losses, reduce violence against civilians and, eventually, demobilise

While that happens, the administration, with the support of donors, should expand the program that is now providing exit ramps for minors in the gangs’ ranks. In cooperation with international experts, it should also start to design a transitional justice system that provides benefits and a measure of judicial reprieve to those who disarm and cooperate with the authorities, while also guaranteeing that there will be no general impunity. It is hard to understate the damage gangs have wrought in Haiti, killing and raping thousands, creating the hemisphere’s worst humanitarian crisis and destroying the lives of millions. Understandably, many Haitians refuse to contemplate responding to the horrors they have endured with anything less than crushing retaliation. But even if the Gang Suppression Force lives up to its promise, it is hard to compute the possible cost in lives and resources of a campaign to destroy the gangs. At some stage, negotiations from a position of strength aimed at protecting civilians and disarming the gangs would serve Haiti far better as a first step on the long path to stability.

Port-au-Prince/New York/London/Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2025. 49p.

By Sally Atkinson-Sheppard

Millions of the world’s children engage in labor, often exploitative and essential to their survival. Child labor is closely related to crime; global discourse illustrates how young people are victims of forced and bonded labor and recent studies from the global South demonstrate how young people are hired as the ‘illicit laborers’ of organized crime groups. Despite this, there is a tendency to consider young people, not as laborers but as victims of trafficking or as offenders (often in relation to gangs). To address this lacuna, the article draws on data from 3 studies conducted in the global South to develop a conceptual framework suitable for understanding the intersection between labor and crime. The article develops a metaphorical ‘labor lens’, a lens which centers and prioritizes labor and instrumental drivers for crime, embedded within wider structures of illicit markets, established organized crime, state:crime collaboration and the need for children to work to survive. The article integrates economic drivers for involvement in organized crime with the moral economy, within the context of ecological frameworks of crime, embedded with wider issues of coloniality. In doing so, the article develops a new conceptual framework for considering young people’s involvement in organized crime.

  Critical Criminology (2023) 31:467–487

By: Megan T. Stevenson and Robynn J.A. Cox

This Article tells the story of the birth of predictive algorithms in criminal justice. Known as risk assessments, these tools are widely used today to make decisions about bail, sentencing, and parole. Their roots trace back to the 1920s, when statistical prediction tools were first proposed for use in criminal justice decision-making. In this Article, we show that risk assessment found its origins in the ideas of eugenic criminology: namely, that crime is mostly caused by an inferior subclass of humanity, tainted from birth. Risk assessment was conceptualized as a way of sorting between the “normals” who were amenable to reform and the “sub-normals” who, due to their inferior genes, were not. Such “born criminals” were seen as requiring indefinite confinement within isolated penal colonies in order to protect society from crime, prevent procreation, and provide care for those in need of paternalistic guidance. We tell this story in part because it is a fascinating piece of history, marked by bigotry, bravado, and an almost fanatical optimism about mankind’s ability to engineer a perfect society. But we also tell it because the ideas and practices of eugenic criminology are not widely known. While “tainted origins” do not automatically condemn the ongoing use of risk assessment, understanding history can help identify ways that the past lives on in the present.

By: Nazgol Ghandnoosh, Ph.D., Director of Research, Bobby Boxerman, Ph.D., former Extreme Sentencing Research Fellow, and Celeste Barry, former Program Associate at The Sentencing Project.

Although it is a widespread practice in the United States to increase criminal penalties for people with prior convictions, there is little evidence that this practice advances public safety.1 Research by the Robina Institute has shown that state and federal sentencing guidelines dramatically increase sentence lengths based on individuals’ prior criminal records. This effect is even more pronounced for African Americans. Given the limited public safety benefits from criminal record “enhancements” and the accompanying harms to incarcerated individuals, their families, and communities — and the steep financial costs — this further lengthening of sentences should be reconfigured.

By The Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime

Levels of organized crime have remained stable across Europe while increasing in most other regions, according to the 2025 Global Organized Crime Index. Europe remains the second-lowest continent for criminality after Oceania. However, this overall stability masks a dynamic situation across criminal markets and criminal actors.

Europe’s overall criminality score stands at 4.74, while its resilience score reaches 6.28 —the highest globally. Although Europe continues to outperform other continents across all 12 resilience indicators, criminality continues to expand and adapt, highlighting the need to update resilience strategies to keep pace with emerging threats.

Financial crime remains the most pervasive criminal market in Europe for the second consecutive edition of the Index. These crimes include increasingly complex and sophisticated fraud schemes, largely occurring online, such as investment fraud, business email compromise and romance scams, as well as embezzlement and tax evasion. Financial crimes are inherently transregional and are particularly facilitated by corruption.

Europe continues to be a global hotspot for cyber-dependent crimes, ranking second continentally. These crimes range from ransomware attacks to malware distribution and cryptocurrency fraud, often targeting government institutions, major corporations and critical infrastructure. Hybrid and traditional cybercrime actors are increasingly intertwined, with state-sponsored groups often disguising themselves as cybercriminals.

Drug markets remain salient. Cocaine and synthetic drugs have recorded the sharpest increases since 2023. Cocaine is a primary source of revenue for numerous organized crime groups in Europe, and the continent functions as a destination, transit hub and consumer market. Synthetic drug production is becoming increasingly dispersed across Europe, with Central and Eastern Europe registering the sharpest increase since 2021. Heroin, by contrast, is showing signs of decline, while cannabis remains the most widely consumed illicit drug.

Human trafficking and human smuggling remain far-reaching and widespread. Smuggling networks are entrenched along the Western Balkans route, and many European countries serve as final destinations where smuggled people may face forced labour or sexual exploitation.

The presence of criminal actors has grown steadily since 2021. Foreign actors remain the most concerning actor type, recording the largest overall increase since 2021. These groups are increasingly heterogeneous, multi-ethnic and interconnected. Private-sector actors also play a pivotal role in laundering illicit funds, while state-embedded actors, though less pervasive than elsewhere, are implicated in facilitating criminal activity in some contexts.

Europe’s resilience strengths lie in international cooperation, national policies and laws, and territorial integrity. However, government transparency and accountability consistently rank lowest among resilience indicators. Anti-money laundering and economic regulatory capacity also remain areas of concern.

While Europe demonstrates relatively strong resilience overall, certain criminal markets and actors are expanding. The findings underscore the need for more effective and tailored response mechanisms as organized crime continues to adapt across the continent.

By Barbara Kelemen | Ján Slobodník

Summary ▪ Mexico’s macroeconomic stability and abundant natural resources have made the country into an attractive destination for Chinese businesses. ▪ The country still suffers from a lack of internal security, most of it stemming from the Mexican Drug War, an ongoing multilateral lowintensity conflict between the Mexican government and a large number of criminal organizations. ▪ In some of Mexico’s states, pervasive violence and instability have resulted in a power vacuum. With the government being unable to guarantee security, non-state actors such as criminal organizations and/or civilian militias seize the opportunity to establish their own rule. ▪ When foreign companies operate in such troubled areas, they inevitably run into problems caused by Mexico’s security issues. ▪ Within this trend of foreign companies operating in Mexico, some level of tacit cooperation has been observed between Chinese businesses and non-state actors. This cooperation is often an outcome of localized security vacuums that are exploited by alternative security providers, such as criminal organizations, that can fill them and provide operational safety for local businesses. ▪ A growing body of research has identified the existence of Chinese illicit networks and their involvement in the trafficking of people, narcotics, and contraband goods, as well as money laundering and illegal arms trade in Mexico. ▪ Concealed under the guise of legal commercial activity, networks of Mexican criminal organizations and their Chinese business partners exploit the dire security situation in some areas of Mexico. ▪ Despite attempts by the Chinese and the Mexican governments to regulate certain sectors that contribute to the existence of the illicit networks in Mexico, there are still substantial opportunities that are ripe for exploitation by the criminal group-legitimate business partnerships.

By: Laurie Caron, Frank Crispino, Cyril Muehlethaler 

Tobacco smuggling remains a widespread illegal activity in Canada, associated with important social and economic impacts, and often linked to organized crime. This study explores the application of forensic profiling as an intelligence tool to support the analysis of contraband cigarette production and distribution. Physical and chemical manufacturing characteristics of seized contraband cigarette packs, provided by police forces, were observed and coded using macroscopic, microscopic, and spectroscopic techniques. Multivariate statistical analyses were then conducted to compare manufacturing characteristics between packs and identify potential links. The analyses highlighted links between cigarette packs and seizures based on shared manufacturing characteristics. The results and the identified groups were also compared with seizure data provided by our collaborator. The results demonstrate the relevance of forensic profiling to formulate hypotheses regarding shared production processes or supply networks. These hypotheses provide information that contributes to understanding tobacco smuggling and aim to examine how forensic intelligence can support law enforcement and measures to prevent and disrupt this criminal activity. A preliminary optimal procedure for applying forensic profiling in operational contexts targeting contraband tobacco was finally proposed. Despite limitations in the dataset creation that were beyond our control, this study represents a starting point for applying this scientific approach to tobacco smuggling.