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 Inés Fynn

“If you see something you have to be blind, deaf, and dumb, that’s how it works here”  “If you keep silent, you don’t mess with them, and they won’t mess with you”  “Everyone here knows what to talk about and what not to talk about”  The above statements exemplify the coping strategies of people living in communities affected by drug gangs. Despite differences in the gangs’ modus operandi, silence is a common factor in how communities respond. The current understanding of criminal territorial control overlooks the role of communities and their silence in shaping how criminal organizations operate. This research aims to explore how drug  gangs establish commitments of silence with communities, how these commitments vary, and why some are more enduring than others. Organized criminal groups often establish localized systems of private order that challenge the territorial reach of the state (O’Donnell, 1993). Comparative politics research has recently focused on criminal governance schemes to analyze the logic of territorial control of drug-trafficking organizations. Criminal governance refers to local orders led by criminal organizations that impose formal or informal rules and restrict the behavior of criminal and non-criminal civilians (Lessing, 2020). However, despite community members dealing with drug gang operations daily, these studies fall short in incorporating the central role of communities in shaping drug gangs’ operations.

  Santiago de Chile, Chile .   Instituto de Ciencia Política Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile , 2023. 178p.

By InSight Crime

In the suffocating heat of summer in El Salvador, José Elvis Herrera Reinoso, alias “Elvis,” is gathered with the family of an elderly woman inside her small home. The woman, who suffers from diabetes, had been close to death just a few days beforehand, but made a seemingly inexplicable recovery. With just a few simple tools, including a Bible and loudspeaker, Elvis guides the family members in a religious celebration of this “miracle.” His well-practiced preaching and passionate reading from the holy book tell anyone listening that he is a dedicated pastor. And the tattoos that cover his face let them know he was a member of the Mara Salvatrucha 13 (MS13), one of the most feared gangs in the world.   

Washington, DC: InSight Crime, 2022. 23p.

By Joana Monteiro, duardo Fagundes , Mariana Carvalho , Ramon Gomes

Some criminal groups are able to avoid confrontation and diversify their economic activities while others are constantly contested by rival groups and the state. To understand why, we propose a model to investigate criminal groups’ incentives to invest in military capacity and the state’s response to arming. Typically it is difficult to map criminal groups’ presence and document their economic activities. We build a novel panel dataset to map presence and characterize the economic activities of criminal groups in Rio de Janeiro, where drug factions and militia groups have controlled territories for at least three decades. We provide evidence that both groups are multi-product enterprises that explore a wide range of licit and illicit goods and services. We empirically test the predictions of our model. Our findings suggest that more groups in the territory increase conflict and state repression and reduce economic diversification. In addition, we argue that the ability to collaborate with the state is crucial for groups to exploit more markets. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that uses systematic data to show how criminal groups in Rio de Janeiro evolve over time and diversify their economic activities. 

Encontro da Sociedade Brasileira de Econometria - Gran Mareiro Hotel | Fortaleza - CE, n: 44º . 2023. 2022. 48p.

By Jonathan D. Rosen and  Hanna Samir Kassab 

  According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the Americas is the most violent region in the world. The Americas has a homicide rate of 16.3 per 100,000 people, while Africa had a homicide rate of 12.5 per 100,000 inhabitants. Europe, Oceania, and Asia had much lower homicide rates with three percent, three percent, and 2.9 percent, respectively (see Fig.  1.1).1 The Americas is also home to the most violent country in the world. In 2015, El Salvador surpassed Honduras as the most violent non-waring nation. Violence has exceeded the days of the country’s civil war, which lasted for more than a decade. In fact, experts note that at one point in 2015 El Salvador had one murder per hour. Jonathan Watts writes, “Last Sunday was, briefly, the bloodiest day yet with 40 murders. But the record was beaten on Monday with 42 deaths, and surpassed again on Tuesday with 43. Even Iraq—with its civil war, suicide bombings, mortar attacks and US drone strikes—could not match such a lethal start to the week.”2 In January 2017, the country saw a rare phenomenon occur: one day without a murder.3 Much of the violence in El Salvador has been a result of gang-related activities as well as the consequences of the government’s tough on crime strategies.4 El Salvador’s neighbors, Guatemala and Honduras, have also seen high levels of gang-related violence.5 Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández argued that 80 percent of the homicides that occur in this country are related to organized crime.  

New York:London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. 165p.

By John Pitts

Drawing upon research undertaken by the present author in East, North West and South London and the work of other UK social scientists, this article considers the evidence concerning the involvement of young people of African-Caribbean origin and Mixed Heritage in street gangs and gang crime in London (For the sake of brevity, I will simply refer to these young people as Black, not least because this is how they usually define themselves). It outlines the sometimes acrimonious debate about the relationship between race, crime and street gangs in the United Kingdom in the past three decades, concluding that while many of the claims made about this relationship may be exaggerated or simply untrue, the evidence for the over-representation of Black young people in street gangs in London is compelling. The article then turns to the changing social and economic predicament of some Black young people in the capital since the 1980s and its relationship with their involvement in gang crime. Finally, it considers the role of drugs business in the proliferation of the gang form and ‘gangsta’ culture and the involvement of growing numbers of younger Black people in County Lines drug dealing.

Youth Justice, Volume 20, Issue 1-2, April-August 2020, Pages 146-158

By Nick Tilley and Matt Hopkins with the assistance of Adam Edwards and John Burrows

Home Office Research Report 10 is the result of a victimisation survey that was conducted in three high crime neighbourhoods in English cities that aimed to establish patterns of organised crime victimisation and the extent to which businesses were invited to participate in organised crime.Local police and community representatives were also interviewed to gauge their views on organised crime and local businesses. The evidence collected suggests that the nature of organised crime in relation to business varies widely by high crime neighbourhood, that invitations to participate in organised crime are very widespread and that the police tend to perceive higher levels of crime organisation affecting businesses than those revealed through surveys.

London: Home Office, 2008. 66p.