By The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

This report offers empirical evidence and case studies from across the OSCE area on how women are recruited into organized crime groups, their roles within them, and how and why they exit these groups. It demonstrates that the role of women in organized crime is nuanced. Evidence shows that while women are often exploited and victimized by organized crime groups, they can also be important actors. Yet persistent gender stereotypes mean that women’s agency in organized crime is often not recognized by criminal justice practitioners. Failing to recognize women’s agency in organized crime impedes the understanding in participating States of the complexity of the organized crime landscape, and hampers their ability to combat transnational organized crime or support women to leave organized crime groups.

Vienna: OSCE, 2023. 72p.

By INTERPOL and ENACT Africa

In the last two decades the percentage of imprisoned women offenders is growing globally, at a faster rate than imprisoned male offenders. 1 Such global increase raises the question as to whether the same can be observed on the African continent . Information suggests that transnational organized crime (TOC) affects African women and girls differently than African men and boys. It is crucial to learn how and if men and women behave differently in TOC in Africa in order to uncover the main drivers of these differences and adapt policing methodology accordingly. While gendered data continues to be insufficiently reported upon by law enforcement authorities in Africa, the assessment suggests that African law enforcement authorities are possibly under -investigating and under -estimating the involvement of African women in TOC. African law enforcement authorities likely continue to perceive them as victims or accomplices only. They are possibly rarely seen as the criminals themselves and less so as being the organizers, leaders, traffickers or recruiters. This gap in police investigations is indeed known to be exploited to the benefit of organized crime as women are more likely to go under the radar . The assessment draws attention to the common features of African female offenders based on available data to share insights and encourage police forces to reconsider their approach.

Lyon, France: INTERPOL, 2021. 32p.

By Nadia Campaniello

In recent decades, women's participation in the labor market has increased considerably in most countries and is converging toward the participation rate of men. Though on a lesser scale, a similar movement toward gender convergence seems to be occurring in the criminal world, though many more men than women still engage in criminal activity. Technological progress and social norms have freed women from the home, increasing their participation in both the labor and the crime market. With crime no longer just men's business, it is important to investigate female criminal behavior to determine whether the policy prescriptions to reduce crime should differ for women.

Bonn: IZA World of Labor, 2019. 11p.

By Sharon White-Harrigan, Michelle Feldman, Zachary Katznelson, Dana Kaplan, Michael Rempel and Joanna Weill

On Rikers Island, the widespread violence, dysfunction, and lack of access to basic services mean no one leaves better off than when they went in. The roughly 300 women and gender-expansive people incarcerated at Rikers are uniquely vulnerable.* They face an elevated risk of sexual abuse and retraumatization.1 Over 80 percent are being treated for mental illness and 27 percent have a serious mental illness. Many are victims of domestic violence. Seventy percent are caregivers, and incarceration has profoundly negative consequences for their children and families. Almost 90 percent are held before trial, mostly due to unaffordable bail. Last fiscal year, the city spent over $550,000 to keep a single person locked up at Rikers for a year.2 New York City is legally required to close Rikers by August 2027. The city is on track to replace the Rikers jail complex with four borough-based facilities closer to courthouses, lawyers, families, and service providers. Women and gender-expansive people, most of whom are currently housed at the Rose M. Singer Center on Rikers (“Rosie’s”), are slated to be relocated to a new facility in Kew Gardens, Queens (see box below). The deaths of 31-year-old Mary Yehudah and the other eight people incarcerated at Rikers who have died this year—underscore the importance of shutting the jails as soon as possible.3

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New York: Center for Court Innovation, 2022. 40p.

By Rosemary L Barberet

"Women, Crime and Criminal Justice speaks to the need for a new book that offers a global and diverse approach to the study of women and criminology. Despite an explosion of interest in international women's issues such as femicide and trafficking in women, criminological books in the area have previously focused predominantly on domestic issues. This is the first fully internationalized book to focus on women as offenders, victims and justice professionals. It provides background, as well as specialized information that allows readers to comprehend the global forces that shape women and crime; analyze different types of violence against women (in peacetime and in armed conflict); and grasp the challenges faced by women in justice professions such as the police, the judiciary and international peacekeeping. Provocative, highly topical, engaging and written by an expert in the field, this book examines the role of women in crime and criminal justice internationally. Topics covered include: the role of globalization and development in patterns of female offending and victimization, how a human rights framework can help explain women's crime, victimization and the criminal justice response, global women's activism, international perspectives on violence against women, including femicide, violence in conflict and post conflict settings, sex work and sex trafficking, women's access to justice, as well as the increased role of women in international criminal justice settings.

London; New York: Routledge, 2014. 248p.

Edited by Ravi K. Thiara, Stephanie A. Condon, and Monika Schröttle

This book draws together both: theory and practice on minority/migrant women and gendered violence. The interplay of gender, ethnicity, religion, class, generation and sexuality in shaping the lives, experiences and choices of minority/migrant women affected by violence has not always been adequately theorised within much of the existing writing on violence against women. Feminist theory, especially the insights provided by the concept of intersectionality, are central to the editors’ conceptual frameworks.

Leverkusen-Opladen: Verlag Barbara Budrich , 2011. 426p.

Edited by Giovanni Fiandaca

The insightful essays in this book shine a new light on the roles of women within criminal networks, roles that in reality are often less traditional than researchers used to think. The book seeks to answer questions from a wide range of academic disciplines and traces the portrait of women tied to organized crime in Italy and around the world. The book offers up accounts of mafia women, and also tales of severe abuse and violence against women.

New York: Springer Science+Business Media, 2007. 307p.