By The Organization of American States, Department against Transnational Organized Crime

The illegal gold trade is a growing and significant challenge in Ecuador. The spread of illegal gold mining activity has brought surges of violence and instability to remote areas while attracting organized crime, at the local and international level, and triggering an increase in money laundering and contraband. Concern regarding the disruptive and harmful impact of illegal gold mining, as well as the government’s desire to develop and expand Ecuador’s mining sector away from its reliance on small-scale and artisanal operations, have also led to a renewed focus on the challenges posed by illegal mining. There is reason to believe that the illegal gold trade and its associated criminal networks are less entrenched and developed in Ecuador than in neighboring Peru and Colombia. However, there are significant challenges facing the government as it works to combat illegal mining activity, which is increasingly accelerated by illicit cross-border contraband flows and unique vulnerabilities to money laundering activity.

Washington, DC: The Organization of American States, Department against Transnational Organized Crime, 2021. 46p.

By The Organization of American States, Department against Transnational Organized Crime

Peru’s well-developed mining sector has shaped the country’s economy and society to a significant degree. The mining sector contributes up to 10% of GDP, while minerals like gold and copper weigh heavily in Peru’s trade composition. Peru’s abundant reserves of mineral resources have helped to fuel the development of its mining sector, attracting a variety of small, medium, and large enterprises to engage in exploration and extraction. However, the country’s mineral wealth and governance challenges in remote mining areas, also offer ample opportunities for organized crime and illegal mining activity. As a result, large populations of illegal miners and transnational criminal networks have become deeply entrenched in Peru, giving the country a central role in the international illegal gold trade. While Peru has taken active steps to combat illegal gold mining and the sale and export of illegal gold, a variety of criminal actors have continued to successfully engage in and promote these illicit activities, producing detrimental effects for citizen security, the economy, and the environment.

Washington, DC: Organization of American States, Department against Transnational Organized Crime 2021. 40p.

This guide begins by describing the problem of hate crimes and reviewing factors that increase its risks. It then identifies a series of questions to help you analyze your local hate crimes problem. It reviews responses to the problem and what is known about these from evaluative research and police practice. Specifically, it describes what you can do to reduce underlying tension in the community that contributes to hate crimes. This guide also outlines what the police can do to address any special fear and trauma experienced by the individual victim and the racial, ethnic, religious, or sexual orientation community to which the victim belongs. Finally, it reviews the police role in monitoring hate groups that have members and conduct activities in your community.

Read more at the Center for Problem Oriented Policing

By ENACT (Enhancing Africa’s response to transnational organized crime)

Ports and airports across Africa continue to be targeted by organised crime groups to traffic illicit goods.

The objective of this report is to assess how organised crime exploits ports and airports in Africa. It aims at identifying and analysing the latest transportation trends and methods used on the continent by organised crime, to further their sphere of operations. This will include detailed explanation of the criminals involved, trafficking routes and specific modus operandi, and recommendations to identify and disrupt these organised crime groups.

The assessment may ultimately help law enforcement in the appropriate targeting and disruption of transnational organised crime groups, and elicit law enforcement cooperation between countries to effectively fight the trafficking of illicit goods via ports and airports in Africa.

Enact (Africa): Lyon, France: INTERPOL, 2020. 47p.

By Francesco Calderoni, Gian Maria Campedelli, Tommaso Comunale, Martina E Marchesi and Ernesto U Savona

This paper provides a narrative synthesis of the results of a systematic review of the social, psychological and economic factors leading to recruitment into organised crime.This is based on the analysis of evidence emerging from 47 qualitative, quantitative and mixed-method studies published in or before 2017.While the selected studies varied markedly in method and quality, several factors emerged as particularly important in understanding recruitment into organised criminal groups. These included the role of social relations (family, kinship, friendship and work-relations), criminal background and criminal skills.

Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology, 2021. 28p.

By Michael Jensen, Elizabeth Yates and Sheehan Kane.

The Proud Boys were formed by Gavin McInnes, co-founder of Vice Media, in 2016 during the U.S. presidential election. Proud Boys consider themselves “Western chauvinists” who romanticize a traditional, male-dominated version of Western culture. While the Proud Boys vehemently deny adhering to a racist ideology, the organization is deeply rooted in white nationalism and misogyny. As of December 31, 2021, 83 Proud Boys members and sympathizers have allegedly carried out ideologically motivated crimes in the United States. This number includes 54 Proud Boys defendants who participated in the Capitol breach on January 6, 2021. Proud Boys defendants have come from 25 states and the District of Columbia, including 14 from Florida, 14 from New York, 7 from Washington, and 6 from Pennsylvania. Using auxiliary data from the Profiles of Individual Radicalization in the United States (PIRUS) project, these infographics provide information on the characteristics of U.S. Proud Boys defendants and their crimes.

College Park, MD: START, 2022. 3p.

By Richard T. Wright, Scott H. Decker and Gilbert Geis

Through extensive and candid interviews, the authors of this ground-breaking work have studied burglars' decision-making processes within the context of their streetlife culture. In this volume they present their findings in the areas of motivation, target selection, methods of entering and searching a residence, and methods of selling stolen goods, concluding with a discussion of the theoretical implications of their research.

Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1996. 248p.

By Rob Mawby

Burglary has all the credentials as the 'folk crime of the new millennium', and is regularly identified as one of the crimes most feared by the public. Victims are particularly affected by burglary, and burglary is generally at the centre of crime prevention and community safety strategies. This book provides an accessible, systematic account of burglary, focusing on the problem of crime in the first main part of the book, and on policy responses in the second. This book identifies the particular characteristics of burglary as a crime, drawing upon an extensive range of research in both the UK

Cullompton, Devon, UK: Willan, 2001. 224p.

By Katherine Hirschfeld

Gangsterism, extortion and racketeering are currently viewed as deviant, pathological behaviors that are disconnected from formal political and economic structures, and often excluded from analysis in the fields of political science and economics. A critical reconsideration of organized crime reveals that the evolution of racketeering in systems of exchange should be understood as a natural phenomenon that can be predicted with tools from behavioral ecology originally developed to model the dynamics of predator-prey relations. These models predict the conditions under which unregulated markets evolve into hierarchical criminal syndicates, and how established organized crime groups expand and intrude into formal systems of government, creating chimeric 'gangster-states'. This book outlines the parameters of this process, and uses archival research to explore case studies of organized crime and kleptocratic state formation. A final section proposes redefining state formation as part of a longitudinal cycle of political-economic evolution that includes phases of racketeering, instability, collapse and regeneration.

Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK; New York:: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 176p.

By EMS Foundation and Ban Animal Trading

The wild animals within the borders of South Africa are part of the heritage of every South African and we have the right to demand that our government protects wild animals against exploitation and to demand accountability from government as to what it does in this regard. Government is empowered by a cogent body of laws to perform this function and it is obliged to do so by international treaties. It is urgently necessary for government to comply with its responsibilities not only because of the ethical, moral and legal compunction to do so but also because the export of our wild animals for the financial gain of a few has become big business.

South Africa has become the largest exporter of live wild animals to Asia, where many wild animals are killed to extract potions from their carcases and are eaten as delicacies. Some are sent to languish in atrocious zoos. Some are inserted into the murky world of the illegal wildlife trade. The reality is that the South African government fails to apply its strong regulatory powers and by design or neglect allows strikingly large numbers of animals to be exported.

South Africa: EMS Foundation and Ban Animal Trading, 2020. 123p.

By Ban Animal Trading and EMS Foundation

The international trade in the majority of reptiles, amphibians and arachnids is mostly unregulated, often unlawful and a growing industry in South Africa. Data on the trade in these species is unreliable and insufficient, because most countries do not keep records or compile data unless the species is listed on the CITES Appendices. Even then the data is incomplete. One reason for this is that, unlike so-called charismatic species such as lions, elephants, tigers and primates―perceived to have higher intrinsic value―reptiles, including species such as snakes, lizards, turtles, tortoises, alligators and crocodiles are, in terms of public perception, and often because of the negative stereotypes attached to them, considered less desirable creatures, lack the charismatic appeal of anthropomorphic species and consequently they are afforded less attention.

South Africa: Ban Animal Trade and EMS Foundation, 2020. 94p.

By Ndiva Kofele-Kale

In the last decade a new tool has been developed in the global war against official corruption through the introduction of the offense of "illicit enrichment" in almost every multilateral anti-corruption convention. Illicit enrichment is defined in these conventions to include a reverse burden clause which triggers an automatic presumption that any public official found in "possession of inexplicable wealth" must have acquired it illicitly. …Combating Economic Crimes therefore sets out to address what has been left unanswered by these multilateral conventions, to wit, the level of burden of proof that should be placed on a public official who is accused of illicitly enriching himself from the resources of the State, balanced against the protection of legitimate community interests and expectations for a corruption-free society. The book explores the doctrinal foundations of the right to a presumption of innocence and reviews the basic due process protections afforded to all accused persons in criminal trials by treaty, customary international law, and municipal law. The book then goes on to propose a framework for balancing and ‘situationalizing’ competing human rights and public interests in situations involving possible official corruption.

Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2012. 248p.

By Chris Mathers

In Crime School: Money Laundering, a twenty-year law enforcement veteran of financial crime explains this felony in simple terms. Written anecdotally, the book describes what money laundering is and how the crimes behind it fit together.

Organized criminals operating both domestically and internationally corrupt bankers and subvert national economies through the use of drug money.

This book examines the history of money laundering from ancient times to the cocaine craze of the 1970s to the sophisticated, brutal techniques employed by today's terrorists and organized crime.

Lively and detailed, this book chronicles the stark realities and deadly dynamics of the lynchpin between organized crime and modern terrorism. It's a rare and fascinating look at a deadly world few have ever witnessed and lived to tell the story.

Buffalo, NY: Firefly Books, 2004. 244p.

By Petter Gottschalk

This book introduces 'convenience' as the key concept to explain financial crime by white-collar criminals. Based on a number of fraud examination- reports from the United States and Norway, the book documents empirical evidence of convenience among white-collar criminals. It advances our understanding of white-collar crime by drawing attention to private investigation reports by fraud examiners and financial crime specialists, who are in the growing business of fraud investigations. Reports of investigations have never before been researched in terms of white-collar criminals nor crime convenience. Reports of investigations by auditing and law firms represent a valuable empirical basis – in addition to court documents and other sources of information about financial crime.

Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016, 134p.

Edited by Nic Ryder

This edited collection provides an innovative and detailed analysis of the relationship between the financial crisis, risk and corruption. A large majority of the published research has concentrated on identifying the traditional factors that contributed towards the largest financial crisis since the Wall Street Crash and subsequent Great Depression. This original volume contests this, and provides the alternative view that white collar crime was also an underappreciated, and important factor.

Divided into five parts: bribery and corruption; financial crime; market manipulation; technology and white collar crime; and the financial crisis, and based on contributions by a wide range of experts in the field, this book will be of great interest to policy makers and practitioners, researchers and students alike.

London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. 377p.

By Nikos Passas

Financial crime affects virtually all areas of public policy and is increasingly transnational. The essays in this volume address both the theoretical and policy issues arising from financial crime and feature a wide variety of case studies, and cover topics such as state revenue collection, criminal enterprises, money laundering, the use of new technologies and methods in financial crime, corruption, terrorism, proliferation of WMD, sanctions, third-world debt, procurement, telecommunications, cyberspace, the defense industry and intellectual property. Taken together, these essays form a must-read collection for scholars and students in law, finance and criminology

London; New York: Routledge, 2013. 642p.

By Harold Winter

Since Gary Becker’s seminal article in the late sixties, the economic analysis of crime has blossomed, from an interesting side field within law and economics, into a mature stand-alone sub-discipline that has been embraced by many well-respected academic economists. Wide ranging and accessible, this is the most up-to-date textbook in this area, taking current economic research and making it accessible to undergraduates and other interested readers. Without use of graphs or mathematical equations, Winter combines theory and empirical evidence with controversial examples from the news media.

London; Routledge, 2008. 146p.

By Harald Haelterman

This book positions script analysis as a useful and pragmatic tool, which can guide the selection and implementation of preventive measures in business environments. It illustrates how the concept aligns with the crime-specific orientation found in environmental criminology, and particularly explores the theoretical foundations of situational crime prevention, the approach to which it is deemed most relevant and supportive.

The volume provides clear guidance on how to apply script analysis in daily practice, covering its main building blocks and key features. These are illustrated by a series of case studies into various crime types. Moving beyond the use of script analysis with the intent to disrupt the crime-commission process, the author further explores the wider benefits of the approach to both academics and practitioners. He identifies what is needed most if we want to embrace the full potential of script analysis for preventive purposes.

London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. 262p.

By Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel

Meet the economic gangster. He’s the United Nations diplomat who double parks his Mercedes on a New York street at rush hour, because the cops can’t touch him-he has diplomatic immunity. He’s the dictator, the warlord, the black marketeers, the unscrupulous bureaucrat who bilks the developing world of billions of aid—and keeps many communities in a cycle of violence and poverty.

We can stop this waste of resources as we follow the foreign aid money trail, and find solutions that can make tremendous difference to the developing world, solutions that can range from cash infusions to diffuse violence in times of drought to guiding the World Bank away from programs most susceptible to corruption. Economic data, often found in unexpected places, can become potent tools in understanding how the global market really works and what is getting in the way of economic progress.

Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008. 256p.

Edited by Tuesday Reitano, Sasha Jesperson and Lucia Bird Ruiz-Benitez de Lugo

This edited volume examines the use of militarised responses to different forms of criminal activity, discussing the outcomes and unintended consequences. Politicians and policymakers frequently use militarised responses to look tough on crime. The deployment of armies, navies, military assets and militarised approaches can send a powerful message, but have produced mixed results. While they generate the perception that governments are actively engaged on issues of concern to the public, and in some cases have resulted in notable successes, on the downside they have frequently also increased the loss of life, exacerbated the humanitarian consequences of a particular crime and entrenched divides between security and state institutions and the criminal proponents, narrowing the possibilities for future negotiated solutions. By focusing on four different areas of criminality – wildlife crime, piracy, migration and drug trafficking – the book allows context and evidence-based conclusions to be drawn on the strategic value and commonality of responses and their outcomes.

Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2017. 353p