By Amanda Doggett, ; Kyla Belisario,; André J. McDonald,; et al

Importance A key concern about recreational cannabis legalization is increases in use and adverse consequences, particularly among young adults (aged 18-29 years) who have the highest prevalence of cannabis use, and especially in higher-risk, more vulnerable young adults. However, few longitudinal studies have examined patterns of cannabis consumption in high-risk young adults over the course of legalization.

Objective To examine changes in cannabis use frequency and cannabis-related consequences over recreational cannabis legalization in Canada in a longitudinal sample of high-risk young adults.

Design, Setting, and Participants Longitudinal observational cohort study following young adults in Ontario, Canada, aged 19.5 to 23.0 years who reported regular heavy episodic drinking (65% past-month cannabis use) at enrollment. Participants were surveyed every 4 months for 3 years between February 2017 and February 2020 (3 prelegalization waves, 4 postlegalization waves). Data were analyzed from March to May 2023.

Exposures Recreational cannabis legalization in Canada and 4 potential moderators of change: sex, income, education, and prelegalization cannabis use frequency.

Main Outcomes and Measures Cannabis use frequency and cannabis-related adverse consequences.

Results In a cohort of 619 high-risk young adults (baseline mean [SD] age, 21.0 [1.2] years; 346 female participants [55.9%]), omnibus model testing revealed significant overall decreases in both cannabis use frequency (F = 2.276, 3000.96; P = .03) and cannabis-related consequences (F = 10.436, 3002.21; P < .001) over time, but these changes were substantially moderated by prelegalization frequency (frequency: F = 7.5224, 3021.88; P < .001; consequences: F = 7.2424, 2986.98; P < .001). Follow-up tests showed individuals who used cannabis more frequently prelegalization significantly decreased their use and cannabis-related consequences postlegalization. In contrast, individuals who did not use cannabis prelegalization exhibited a small magnitude increase in frequency over time but nonsignificant changes in cannabis-related consequences. Sex, income, and education did not moderate changes over time.

Conclusions and Relevance In this cohort study of high-risk young adults, individuals using cannabis frequently prelegalization showed significant reductions in use and consequences over time, reflecting an aging out pattern. Small increases in use among participants with no prelegalization use were observed over time, but without parallel changes in cannabis-related consequences. The results did not reveal substantive adverse near-term outcomes across the legalization period, although a within-participants design cannot rule out the possibility of alternative trajectories in the absence of legalization.

JAMA Netw 5 September 2023Open; 6(9); 2023

By Matt Herbert and Lucia Bird Ruiz-Benitez de Lugo i

Since the turn of the millennium, organized crime has surged from a small number of locally or regionally active organizations into a plethora of syndicates operating throughout the globe. Their operations are now often transnational, either active in multiple countries or involved with illicit commodity chains that extend across borders and interlink different regions.

Organized crime players are increasingly active in criminal markets, from human trafficking to cybercrime to illicit fuel sales. Although the value of global organized crime activity is unknown – and likely unknowable with any real precision because of its nature – it is huge. Individual markets such as drug trafficking or timber extraction are estimated to generate hundreds of billions of dollars annually.

The rising prevalence and profitability of organized crime have had a substantial impact in many of the states in which networks operate. In part, this is through the corruption and/or coercion of state officials to allow criminal activity or purchasing impunity.

Such official complicity is now the most important factor enabling the spread and operations of organized crime and also a key impediment to efforts to design solutions and build resilience to it.

Criminal groups have been important sponsors of armed groups seeking to control, in full or in part, the territory of states across the world. Increasingly, organized crime actors have developed autonomous military capacity, becoming key threats to peace and security in their own right. Impacts of organized crime on governance also manifest from the bottom up, with local communities highly vulnerable to criminal actors’ attempts to violently seize de facto control, limit access to public services or establish alternative governance structures.

Because of this profusion of impacts, the international community is devoting increasing resources to counter the phenomena of rising organized crime. At a national level, this has seen greater funding of security force and criminal justice actors, an expansion that is mirrored in international aid, with heightened donor focus on security sector reform and governance, judicial sector training and programmes to build binational and multinational coordination on security challenges, including organized crime.

The international community has also sought to build arrangements for multilateral reciprocal cooperation, such as the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC), also known as the Palermo Convention. However, these have struggled to achieve the necessary effects and are often outpaced by criminal evolution, leading many states to prefer unilateral or ad hoc initiatives to address transnational organized crime. Further, many governments are shifting their approach to organized crime, assessing it as a national security threat rather than purely as a criminal justice challenge. The result has been that, while criminal justice tools such as multilateral arrangements con-tinue to be relied upon, other approaches – involving military, financial and diplomatic tools – are becoming increasingly common. The use of targeted sanctions has emerged as part of this expanding international toolkit to address organized crime.

Such sanctions can be defined as legal authorities that prohibit certain forms of otherwise licit activity, including financial access or travel, for a specific entity in order to hamper their pursuit of a specific goal. Historically, they have mostly been used against countries whose activities were interpreted as threats to peace and security or individuals who had breached international law or norms. Despite the growing use, there has been limited tracing of why and how different international actors have converged in their use of targeted sanctions, how they have developed processes to issue and implement sanctions regimes and their impact and effectiveness. This report series focuses on the use of targeted sanctions against criminal actors. The series encompasses both global reports and country-specific and thematic studies.

Geneva, SWIT: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2023. 75p.

By Summer Walker I Mariana Botero Restrepo

The relationship between illicit economies, conflict and instability has been long debated in academic and practitioner circles, and part of the international policy agenda for some time. From the diamond trade in Sierra Leone to the heroin trade in Afghanistan, illicit economies have been shown to fund insurgencies and political actors, and to contribute to ongoing conflict.

The GI-TOC’s 2021 Global Organized Crime Index shows that of the ten highest-scoring countries for criminality, meaning those with the most pervasive criminal markets and influential criminal actors, the overwhelming majority are countries experiencing conflict or fragility.

This report considers three case studies at different stages of armed conflict to assess the dynamic relationship between criminal networks, illicit economies, and conflict actors and conditions. These three case studies offer unique perspectives in terms of duration, size of the conflict area and stage of the conflict:

• Armed insurgency in northern Mozambique

• Armed groups in Libya and Mali

• Armed groups in Colombia

While these conflicts present three distinct cases, they also share relevant similarities. In these cases, unrest is created after an armed group or groups counter the legitimacy of the state. The national response to the conflict is supplemented with regional and international responses. All situations lack a swift resolution, and the instability persists primarily in areas outside capitals, even after formal conflict resolution. In this way, these three cases are representative of sustained, localized instability deriving from armed conflict between the state and non-state armed groups.

All three conflict areas overlap with areas of established illicit economies. In these settings, the connections between armed conflict and illicit markets evolve over time. The impacts may be commodity-dependent, with different considerations for illegal mining as opposed to trafficked drugs. Illicit markets change over time, as do the power brokers and beneficiaries involved. Illicit economies contribute to long-term enabling environments for instability by prolonging conflict and eroding government responses to conflict. Through the case studies of northern Mozambique, the Sahel region and Colombia, this report identifies ten dynamics that influence illicit economies and conflict situations. These findings make a contribution to vital policy discussions for stabilization and conflict mediation in these – and other – re

Geneva, SWIT: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime., 2022. 74p.

By Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime

Before February 2022, Russian and Ukrainian organized crime formed the strongest criminal ecosystem in Europe. Having developed along similar lines in the 1990s, Russian and Ukrainian criminal groups and networks controlled a lucrative transnational smuggling highway between Russia and Western Europe that carried gold, timber, tobacco, coal, counterfeit/untaxed goods, humans and drugs. At the more politically connected end of the spectrum, corrupt officials and criminal bosses from both countries exploited Ukraine’s role as a transit country for Russian gas to siphon off millions of dollars, while Ukraine’s oligarch class exerted a strong grip over the country’s economic, political and information spheres.

Kyiv made serious efforts to tackle organized crime and corruption after the 2014 Maidan Revolution but results were mixed, especially in the case of judicial reform; meanwhile, the conflict in the Donbas region helped bolster an array of illicit economies and criminal actors. For organized crime, business was generally good.

The Russian invasion has inflicted a profound shock to this ecosystem. With the war, collaboration between Russian and Ukrainian organized crime interests became impossible due to the political situation (which led many criminals to break such ties) and the pragmatic challenge of smuggling across what was now a violently contested and dynamic front line. Many Ukrainian crime bosses chose to leave the country, as did many oligarchs, including several accused of pro-Russian sympathies. Martial law and the curfew also initially constrained criminal activity. According to senior sources in the Ukrainian police, incidents of armed robberies declined by a factor of between three and four, and the homicide rate dropped to almost zero at the beginning of the war (although this may partly reflect the impact of the war on reporting in the early days of the war). It may be that the impact of the invasion also whittled out some less robust and resilient organized crime groups: according to data from the general prosecutor’s office, the number of organized crime groups under investigation decreased from 499 in 2021 to 395 in 2022 (although this decline alternatively could reflect dimished investigative capacity).

This report explores the changing dynamics in the political economy of Ukrainian organized crime up till December 2022 and maps how the criminal landscape has adapted to the new situation. Given the complexity of the impact of the war in Ukraine on organized crime in both parties to the conflict, the GI-TOC is producing two reports. This report concentrates on developments within Ukraine’s internationally recognized borders – with the exception of the so-called Luhansk and Donetsk ‘people’s republics’ (LDNR) in the Donbas region, which broke away from Kyiv in 2014 with Russian backing and assistance, and Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed the same year. The impact of the conflict on organized crime in these areas and on Russian organized crime more generally will be discussed in a separate report, which will assess trends in sanctions busting and money laundering, changes in trafficking flows east of Ukraine and how Russian organized crime groups have responded to the conflict.

Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2023. 60p.

By Julia Stanyard | Thierry Vircoulon | Julian Rademeyer

Russia has rapidly increased its engagement in Africa in recent years, both politically and economically, as it seeks to expand its influence on the continent. However, Russia’s activities in Africa are subject to controversy. Our new report sheds light on the Wagner Group, a private military company rapidly becoming the most effective form of Russian engagement in Africa.

The group comprises a network of political influence operations and economic entities such as mining companies. It has been accused of using whatever means necessary to achieve its aims, including criminal activity. The US government recently designated Wagner as a ‘transnational criminal organization,’ allowing for broader sanctions against Wagner and its enablers.

The report argues that the Wagner Group is unique as an organization in the breadth, scale, and boldness of its activities. However, the study also shows that Wagner did not emerge in a vacuum: The group’s activities and characteristics reflect broader trends in the evolution of Russia’s oligarchs and organized crime groups, their respective relationships with the Russian state, and their activities in Africa.

By focusing on case studies in several African countries, the report helps to shed light on the complex dynamics between Russia, its oligarchs, and its criminal networks and how they interact with African governments, businesses, and populations. This report draws on research conducted since July 2022, as well as other sources from across the continent, providing a comprehensive overview of the Wagner Group’s operations in Africa. The report provides important insights into the evolving relationship between Russia and Africa and how this is shaping politics and economics on the continent, serving as a resource for journalists, policymakers, and researchers seeking to understand the complex dynamics of Russian engagement in Africa.

Center for the Study of Democracy; Global Initiative Against Organized Crime, 2023.92p.

By Ruggero Scaturro

Recent studies conducted by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC) and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) show that the war in Ukraine may displace existing drug trafficking routes from and through Ukraine and exacerbate the instability that enables drug trafficking and manufacturing, including in areas not directly connected or exposed to hostilities.

Trauma derived from the conflict might also have an impact on current and future drug use patterns in communities affected by the war, which could create new opportunities for both local and foreign drug traffickers to meet this growing demand. This becomes particularly relevant when analyzing flows of traditional opioids as well as new psychoactive substances (NPS), and stimulants used by both civilians and soldiers at the front line. Neighbouring Ukraine, the South Eastern Europe region represents a relatively small market for drug consumption and accounts for only a small amount of drug production and supply (primarily cannabis) to EU markets. However, its strategic location between East and West – and its proximity to the Ukraine conflict – might mean that it is particularly exposed to the effects of the war on traffickers’ modus operandi and trafficking routes through the region.

Since February 2022, the Russian invasion of Ukraine has caused the progressive displacement and movement of traditional drug production and trafficking hubs in southern and eastern Ukraine towards the west, around the borders with Poland, Slovakia and Romania. Similarly, in the context of criminal mobility, overwhelmed border security management between Ukraine and its neighbouring countries to the west leads to opportunities for both Ukrainian and Russian criminals to operate and manage their businesses from South Eastern Europe, thanks to the possibility to forge documents and receive ‘golden’ passports due to their investments in countries in the region.

This report assesses whether the war in Ukraine and its resulting disruption are having a significant impact on drug flows through South Eastern Europe. The research is based on the assumption that, because of an intensified military presence in Eastern Europe, traditional flows of drugs have been, at least temporarily, disrupted. This includes the northern route of opioids from Afghanistan, which supplies large markets across Central Asia, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Furthermore, other drug routes, such as for cocaine from Latin America to the port of Odesa, have atrophied. Conversely, flows along alternative routes, such as the Balkan route, appear to have intensified.

In view of these shifts, this report offers an assessment of emerging trends in drugs flows and provides an overview of data on seizures in South Eastern Europe. It also assesses the impact that the Ukraine war is having on wholesale and retail drug prices and, where assessment is possible, on levels of purity and the perceived quality of substances.

Center for the Study of Democracy; Global Initiative Against Organized Crime, 2023. 28p.

By Véronique Irwin; Ke Wang; Jiashan Cui; and Alexandra Thompson

This report is the 25th in a series of annual publications produced jointly by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) and the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), Institute of Education Sciences, Department of Education. It provides official estimates of school crime and safety from a variety of data sources, including national surveys of students, teachers, principals, and post-secondary institutions. The report presents data on different types of student victimization, measures of school conditions, and student perceptions about their personal safety at school. Indicator 2: Incidence of Victimization at School and Away From School includes data from BJS’s National Crime Victimization Survey. Each of the 23 indicators is presented separately, and all indicators can be found in the Condition of Education at NCES.

Highlights:

• For students ages 12–18, the rate of nonfatal criminal victimization (including theft and violent victimization) at school in 2019 was not significantly different than the rate in 2010. From 2019 to 2021, the rate at school decreased from 30 to 7 victimizations per 1,000 students.

• Lower percentages of public school teachers in 2020–21 than in 2011–12 reported being threatened with injury by a student from their school (6 vs. 10 percent) and being physically attacked by a student from their school (4 vs. 6 percent).

• Higher percentages of public schools in 2019–20 than in 2009–10 reported problems with student cyberbullying (16 vs. 8 percent) at least once a week.

• Lower percentages of students in grades 9–12 in 2019 than in 2009 reported the following issues: having been in a physical fight on school property in the previous 12 months (8 vs. 11 percent); carrying a weapon on school property during the previous 30 days (3 vs. 6 percent); and using alcohol on at least 1 day during the previous 30 days (29 vs. 42 percent).

Washington, DC: The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) and National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), Institute of Education Sciences, and Department of Education , 2023,

By Felber J. Arroyave, Alexander M. Petersen, Jeffrey Jenkins & Rafael Hurtado

Illicit wildlife trafficking poses a threat to the conservation of species and ecosystems, and represents a fundamental source of biodiversity loss, alongside climate change and large-scale land degradation. Despite the seriousness of this issue, little is known about various socio-cultural demand sources underlying trafficking networks, for example the forthright consumption of endangered species in different cultural contexts. Our study illustrates how wildlife trafficking represents a wicked problem at the intersection of criminal enforcement, cultural heritage and environmental systems management. As with similar network-based crimes, institutions are frequently ineffective at curbing wildlife trafficking, partly due to the lack of information detailing activities within illicit trading networks. To address this shortcoming, we leverage official government records documenting the illegal trade of reptiles in Colombia. As such, our study contributes to the understanding of how and why wildlife trafficking persists across robust trafficking networks, which are conduits for a broader range of black-market goods. Leveraging geo-spatial data, we construct a multiplex representation of wildlife trafficking networks, which facilitates identifying network properties that are signatures of strategic trafficker behavior. In particular, our results indicate that traffickers’ actions are constrained by spatial and market customs, a result which is apparent only within an integrated multiplex representation. Characteristic levels of sub-network coupling further indicate that traffickers strategically leverage knowledge of the entire system. We argue that this multiplex representation is essential for prioritizing crime enforcement strategies aimed at disrupting robust trade networks, thereby enhancing the effectiveness and resources allocation of institutions charged with curbing illicit trafficking. We develop a generalizable model of multiplex criminal trade networks suitable for communicating with policy makers and practitioners, thereby facilitating rapid translation into public policy and environmental conservation efforts.

Applied Network Science volume 5, Article number: 20 (2020)

By Meredith L. Gore , Robert Mwinyihali , Luc Mayet Gavinet Duclair, Makaya Baku-Bumb , etc.

Urban wildmeat consumption can contribute to significant declines in wildlife populations, ecosystem function, and food insecurity security. Describing types of individuals involved in illegal urban wildmeat trafficking can help distinguish ordinary citizens from members of criminal organizations and urban vs. rural dimensions of the activity. This research aimed to: (1) create and apply a typology for urban wildmeat traffickers and sellers; and (2) explore linkages between types of urban wildmeat traffickers and sellers. We used focus groups with experts in the Republic of the Congo, February 2019 (N = 2, n = 7–10) to achieve objectives and focused on pangolins, great apes, and dwarf crocodiles. Participants generated risk rankings for each species, typology and city; data was encoded and indexed. Results illustrate heterogeneity in actors involved in the illegal supply chain. Business sideliner and trading charity trafficker types were associated with the highest total risk to wildlife trafficking. A similar pattern of divergence was detected for seller typologies; hidden and casual sellers were associated with the greatest total risk in Pointe Noire and Brazzaville, respectively. Differentiating but not stove piping stakeholders involved in urban wildmeat trafficking will help clarify stages of illegal supply chains as well and promote thinking about new sectors to involve in interventions and solutions, particularly in urban ecosystems thought to be outside the scope to wildlife crime.

Global Ecology and Conservation. Volume 27, June 2021, e01557

By Michelle Anagnostou

The intensified illegal trade of wildlife has contributed to the unsustainable decline of wildlife populations, the destabilization of ecosystems, and threatens economic development and human security. Though often lacking empirical evidence, convergence theory has emerged recently as a topic of interest among researchers, practitioners, and the media to explain the growing overlap of criminal activities in an increasingly globalized world. In this paper, I explain the interdisciplinary theoretical foundations for the interconnectivity of criminal networks, including connections between illegal wildlife trade networks and non-state armed groups. I also outline and discuss various perspectives on the convergence of the illegal wildlife trade with other organized crime activities. I conclude by highlighting the urgent need for a better understanding of the role of the organized criminal groups involved in the illegal wildlife trade, and of how these groups converge with other types of criminal activities. The policy implications of filling in this knowledge gap are twofold: firstly, understanding how criminal networks converge can facilitate the implementation of more effective law enforcement and investigations that target high-profile offenders, as opposed to focusing on low-level poachers; and secondly, this understanding can foster more cooperation across agencies and jurisdictions to address multiple crime types and crime in convergence settings

Environmental Challenges. Volume 5, December 2021, 100222

By Earth League International and John Jay College of Criminal Justice

Environmental crime convergence, the focal point of this report, poses an imminent threat to our planet’s delicate ecosystems. To address this urgent issue, ELI, and John Jay College present ELI’s revolutionary 4-Type Environmental Crime Convergence paradigm to comprehensively understand and combat the intricate web of transnational organized crime operations that perpetuate environmental degradation.

The foundation of this report is built upon the fieldwork and intelligence analysis of ELI’s investigators and crime analysts, who have gathered first-hand evidence of Environmental Crime Convergence directly from some of the world’s most notorious environmental criminals and their networks. Drawing on years of investigative fieldwork in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia, over two dozen case studies have emerged from ELI’s work as primary sources of data.

This report highlights five (5) case studies of the transnational criminal networks in Latin America identified by ELI that illustrate the convergence of environmental and wildlife crime with other serious crimes and expose the severity of the issue at a global scale.

Los Angeles: Earth League International, 2023. 83p.

By Alejandro Melgoza and Alex Papadovassilakis

We traveled over 300 kilometers through a trio of nature reserves to document how illegal loggers have ravaged some of the region’s most biodiverse forests and to chronicle the unlikely story of a small group of park rangers fighting back. This investigation, which used video and other multimedia elements to explain this complex criminal economy, is our most in-depth exploration of environmental crime yet..

Washington, DC: InSight Crime, 2022. 38p.

By Raminta Daniulaityte, Kaylin Sweeney , Seol Ki, Bradley N. Doebbeling and Natasha Mendoza

Background: Worsening of the overdose crisis in the USA has been linked to the continuing proliferation of non-pharmaceutical fentanyl (NPF). The recent wave of NPF spread in the USA has been fueled by an increased presence of counterfeit pills that contain NPF. This qualitative study aims to characterize the motivation and practices of counterfeit NPF pill initiation and use among individuals using illicit opioids in Arizona. Methods: Between October 2020 and May 2021, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 individuals meeting the following eligibility criteria: (1) 18 years or older; (2) residence in Arizona; and (3) use of illicit opioids in the past 30 days and/or opioid use disorder treatment in the past 12 months. Participants were recruited through referrals by a harm reduction organization, craigslist ads, and referrals by other participants. Interviews were conducted virtually via Zoom. Qualitative interviews were transcribed and analyzed thematically using NVivo. Results: Out of 22 participants, 64% were male, and 45% were ethnic minorities. Age ranged between 25 and 51 years old. Participants noted significant recent increases in the availability of counterfeit NPF pills (“blues,” “dirty oxys”) that were most commonly used by smoking. The majority indicated frst trying NPF pills in the past year, and the frst use often occurred in situations of reduced access to heroin or pharmaceutical opioids. Participant decisions to switch over to more frequent NPF pill use or to maintain some levels of heroin use were shaped by local drug availability trends and personal experiences with NPF efects. They were also infuenced by conficting views of social acceptability of pharmaceutical-like drugs, perceived harms of NPF in terms of overdose risks and increased difculty of quitting, and perceived benefts of switching to the non-injection route of opioid administration (e.g., from injecting heroin to smoking NPF pills). Conclusion: Our fndings highlight the need for the implementation of novel policy, treatment, and harm reduction approaches to address the growing unpredictability of drug supply and NPF pill-specifc risks, attitudes, and behaviors.

Harm Reduction Journal (2022) 19:52

By Kelly M. Babchishin, Leslie-Anne Keown, and Kimberly P. Mularczyk

Employment is a key factor that helps reduce reoffending rates among individuals with criminal records. The current study examined the economic outcomes of 11,158 federal offenders (Mage in 2014 = 47 years) admitted to Correctional Service of Canada institutions between January 4th, 1999 and December 31st 2001 (medianadmission year = 2000) who were released in the community for an average of 14 years. The purpose of the current study was to better understand the economic outcomes of Canadian federal offenders. More than half of the cohort of released offenders filed their taxes (5,835 of 11,158). The current study suggests that individuals with criminal records face considerable barriers when seeking employment in Canada, with only half of the individuals released from federal institutions finding employment after an average of 14 years. Individuals released from federal correctional institutions participated in the labour market less, made substantially less employment income, received more social assistance payments, and filed taxes less than the general Canadian population. After an average of 14 years post release, most individuals were underemployed with a median income of $0. Of those who reported employment, the average reported income was $14,000. This is less than half of what Canadians in the general population earn through employment. We also found that barriers to finding gainful employment following incarceration disproportionately impacted women, Indigenous, and older individuals, with these groups fairing even poorer than men, non-Indigenous, and younger individuals with criminal records. The current study suggests that more should be done to assist individuals with a criminal record secure gainful employment.

RESEARCH REPORT: 2021-R002 . Ottawa:; Public Safety Canada, 2021. 37p.

By Teun van Ruitenburg

This book is about the concerns and unremitting attempts of Dutch state authorities to control and raise barriers against outlaw motorcycle gangs.It discusses why and how Dutch mayors go to great lengths to prevent the settlement of outlaw motorcycle gangs in clubhouses and bars in their cities; how private actors are urged to prevent members from wearing their vests during events; how state authorities look for ways to divert members away from civil service and private security companies; how the Dutch National Police attempt to frustrate the internal cohesiveness of outlaw motorcycle gangs through criminal investigations; and why the Dutch courts recently banned a number of clubs at the request of the Public Prosecution Service. In the attempt to describe, understand and explain this approach, this thesis builds on the work of several scholars who all in their own way characterized contemporary society by the efforts to prevent crime in the earliest stages possible,which attempts are inherently coupled with a focus on the ‘future’, ‘threats’, ‘dangers’, ‘indicators’, ‘barriers’ and ‘risks’. Today, there is indeed hardly an escape from crime control initiatives that are centred around risk prevention. Following up on the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), national governments are bound to take on a risk-based approach and to map the indicators and risk to prevent money laundering and terrorism financing. To do so, legal entities are monitored for suspicious patterns on the basis of predetermined risk profiles, which also includes a thorough background check of the director(s) of the company and his or her family members. The municipality of Amsterdam together with authorities such as the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) recently came up with what was called a ‘new barrier’ in the fight against criminal money in the hotel and catering industry. The municipality started to decline permits for restaurants and pubs in cases where the applicant was not able to prove a legal origin of his investment money. To give a different example, whether or not a mentally disordered detainee is allowed to go on parole also depends on the outcome of a recidivism risk assessment. Increasingly, researchers are powering this risk-based approach by researching and validating the potential indicators for organized crime, which is intended to help law enforcement agencies in preventing crime more effectively. Departing from this context, this study aims to understand the attempts of the Dutch government to control the risk(s) of outlaw motorcycle gangs. What is unique to this empirical study, however, is that aside from today’s approach to outlaw motorcycle gangs, it also digs into the Dutch approach to outlaw motorcycle gangs in the past, and subsequently how this past connects with the present. By conducting a social constructivist analysis through time, we will learn that the approach to outlaw motorcycle gangs has made a 180-degree turn, which in general terms involved a shift from inclusion in the 1970sto exclusion in present times. I will show that this development was indeed influenced by the continuous pursuit to free society from crime or risks by raising technical, cost-effective, and preventive barriers. However, my key argument is to suggest that the risk thesis only serves one part of the explanation. Today’s efforts to raise preventive barriers against outlaw motorcycle gangs must not be solely explained by the urge to prevent crime, but also as a way to mark the moral boundaries of society. Therefore, the barriers raised, as I suggest herein, are best described as ‘moral barriers’. This conclusion is fuelled by the finding that ‘the’ outlaw motorcycle gang is not only understood by law enforcement agencies as a risk factor for future criminal activities. Also the mere existence of the phenomenon in the present is deemed to have an undermining effect on the norms, rules, laws, and authorities of the democratic state. By providing this in-depth view of the Dutch approach to outlaw motorcycle gangs, I hope to spark the attention of any student eager to learn more about crime control in general, of the researcher involved in researching (the approach to) outlaw motorcycle gangs, and the law enforcement official directly involved in fighting the crimes committed by members of outlaw motorcycle gangs. In doing so, I above all hope to shed a new light on a much discussed and very interesting topic.

The Hague: Eleven International Publishing, 2020. 426p.

By Robert A. Roks & James A. Densley

Based on ethnographic fieldwork and a content analysis of secondary sources, the current study presents an in-depth case study of gang evolution. We chart the history and development of the Dutch Crips, from playgroup origins in the 1980s to criminal endeavors in the 1990s, to its rebirth as an Outlaw Motorcycle Gang in the 2000s. At each evolutionary stage, we examine the identity of the group, its organization, the nature of its criminal activities, and branding. We highlight how, over 30 years, the Crips constantly reinvented themselves to meet their members’ age-defined needs and to attract future generations to the group.

April 2020 Deviant Behavior 41(4):525–542

By Ken Opala

Despite the August 2022 elections proceeding relatively smoothly, there is still a clear nexus between politics and crime in the country.

Election violence remains a major problem in Kenya despite attempts by the state and other actors to tackle it. Ahead of the country’s fifth general election, held on 9 August 2022, state agencies, the media and civil society predicted the re-emergence of gangs and militias keen to influence its outcome. Although the elections went off relatively smoothly there is still a clear nexus between politics and crime.

ENACT-Africa, 2023. 24p.

By Nancy Frank

FROM CHAPTER 1: “OVER THE LAST ten to fifteen years, a number of tragic episodes have elevated public consciousness of crimes against health and safety. The Love Canal disaster, in which an entire neighborhood had to be permanently evacuated because it had been built on an abandoned chemical dump, became only a prelude to a growing awareness of hazardous waste disposal problems. In the Pinto case the Ford Motor Company was indicted on charges of reckless homicide for selling the Pinto even though the company allegedly was aware that the car had a tendency to explode when involved in rear-end collisions. The accident at Three Mile Island, in which a nuclear reactor started to melt down before technicians were able to bring it under control, dramatically illustrated the risks that are created and managed by profit-seeking firms.”

NY. Harrow and Heston. 1985. 112p.

By R. Nishino and T. Kitade  

 TRAFFIC conducted online surveys to track changes after voluntary ivory bans were introduced from November 2019 on Yahoo Shopping and Yahoo Auction, Japan’s largest platforms for online ivory trade, following similar voluntary bans already implemented by Rakuten-Ichiba, Rakuma and Mercari. The trading practices of a major auction house, Mainchi Auction, and trends in illegal ivory exports were also examined to understand better the domestic ivory market in Japan. The COVID-19 pandemic has made it difficult to assess physical markets. RESULTS: Effective measures by companies The number of shops selling ivory on Yahoo Shopping and Rakuten-Ichiba as B2C (business to consumer) trade and the volume of ivory trade on Yahoo Auction, a mixture of B2C and C2C (consumer to consumer) trade, have reduced by almost 100% and more than 99%, respectively as a result of the platform-wide voluntary ivory ban. There was no observable shift in either B2C or C2C trade to other platforms after the introduction of the ivory ban on Yahoo’s platforms. Monitoring of ivory bans by companies such as Mercari and Rakuma was seen to have been effective 

TRAFFIC, Japan Office, Tokyo, Japan., 2020. 30p.

By Benjamin D. Scher , Scott D. Neufeld , Amanda Butler , Matthew Bonn , Naomi Zakimi , Jack Farrell , and Alissa Greer

In light of North America’s persisting drug toxicity crisis, alternative drug policy approaches such as decriminalization, legalization, regulation, and safer supply have increasingly come to the forefront of drug policy discourse. The views of people who use drugs toward drug policy and drug law reform in the Canadian context are essential, yet largely missing from the conversation. The aim of this study was to capture the opinions, ideas, and attitudes of people who use drugs toward Canadian drug laws and potential future alternatives. Methods: This paper was developed as part of the Canadian Drug Laws Project, a cross-jurisdictional qualitative study conducted in British Columbia, Canada between July and September 2020. The qualitative data are from 24 semi-structured interviews with a diverse sample of people who use illegal drugs. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, coded, and analyzed thematically by the research team. Results: Two main themes and corresponding sub-themes are presented: (1) The experience of stigma as a consequence of criminalization; (2) The perceived benefits of drug law reform. Participants spoke in-depth about their experiences living within a criminalized drug policy context and offered suggestions for new pathways forward. Their perspectives illuminate how Canada’s drug laws may shape public attitudes toward people who use drugs and the consequent manifestations of structural, social, and self-stigma experienced by people who use drugs. Conclusion: Participants openly and profoundly believed that current drug laws produced and propagated the public attitudes and structural inequities experienced by people who use drugs in Canada. This matters, not only because our findings highlight the fact that people who use drugs experience stigma in tangible and clearly impactful ways, but it also suggests that the criminalization of drugs shapes the experience of structural, social, and self stigma. Finally, participants believed that efforts to destigmatize people who use drugs would be ineffectual without the enactment of more robust forms of drug law reform such as the decriminalization of illegal drugs.

Contemporary Drug Problems 1-24 © The Author(s) 2023