By Venezuela Investigative Unit

In 2013, Nicolás Maduro became president of Venezuela following the death of his charismatic predecessor Hugo Chávez. Since then, the country’s cocaine trade has undergone revolutionary changes. Today, Venezuela is at risk of becoming the world’s fourth cocaine-producing country. And the Maduro regime has positioned itself as the gatekeeper to the country’s drug trade, controlling access to cocaine’s riches not only for drug traffickers but also for corrupt politicians and the military-embedded trafficking network known as the “Cartel of the Suns.” The product of more than three years of investigations, hundreds of interviews and field work in all of Venezuela’s key drug trafficking territories, this InSight Crime investigation looks at one of the world’s most important cocaine trafficking hubs – and the authoritarian regime that keeps the drugs flowing.

Washington, DC: Insight Crime, 2022. 53p.

By Venezuela Investigative Unit

Is Venezuela now a hybrid state, where the line between governance and criminality has blurred, or even disappeared altogether? The start of this evolution can be traced back 20 years to then-President Hugo Chávez and his willingness to use all means necessary to cling to power. Since then, the country has seen the emergence of new generations of hybrid armed groups, which systematically coordinate and cooperate with elements of the state. In some parts of Venezuela, authorities now co-govern with these groups, working hand in hand to maintain social control over the population and to counter political, social, and economic threats.

Washington, DC: Insight Crime, 2023. 41p

By Mark R. Mallon

Informal entrepreneurship represents a common mode of business formation globally and entails starting and operating a business without registering it with legal authorities. Despite the size of the informal sector in many countries, the motivations for entrepreneurs to operate non-registered ventures are not well understood. Although formal institutions play an important role, we argue that the decision to operate a non-registered new venture is influenced by a pervasive informal institution around the world: the practice of extortion payments to organized crime. Because criminal organizations foster the development of norms and beliefs cementing extortion payments as an institution, we posit that entrepreneurs will use non registration as a buffer to avoid extortion costs preemptively. We further explicate that this choice is contingent upon founders’ access to resources and ventures’ product-market strategy, which shape visibility to organized crime and the ability to resist extortion and, thus, alter the need for non- registration as a buffer against institutionalized extortion. Our analysis of over 8,000 new ventures operating in 39 economies largely supports these arguments. This study identifies a novel causal mechanism in the nomological network of informal entrepreneurship, namely, the prevalence of organized crime, and informs a multilevel theory of how entrepreneurs choose the type of organizational form for their ventures. Finally, it illuminates the importance of shadow institutions—illegal and not widely accepted practices—which may operate as unique but often overlooked types of institutions that shape entrepreneurial and organizational decisions.

Journal of Management, 48(1): 2022.

By Diane E. Davis and Tina Hilgers

Using a focus on the ways that Covid-19 has impacted everyday life in urban Latin America, this article examines the shifting activities of organized criminal groups in the context of a global pandemic. Using grounded ethnographic fieldwork drawn from Brazil, it asks whether a health crisis with direct life and death consequences has empowered illicit actors, and by so doing changed long-standing relationships between illicit actors and citizens on one hand, and/or illicit actors and local authorities on the other. Its larger aim is to understand whether and how the global pandemic has impacted governance by producing new scalar and sovereignty tensions between state and non-state actors at the scale of the city, and with what implications for the legitimacy of national authorities and democratic governance more generally.

Journal of Illicit Economies and Development, 4(3), pp. 241–256, 2022. DOI: https:// doi.org/10.31389/jied.134

By John Collins

This report aims to provide a broad overview of cryptocurrencies and organized crime. It is meant for readers that may have an expertise in one, both or neither, as a means to better understand the challenges posed by emerging blockchain technologies and decentralized finance. The paper argues that blockchain technologies and their derivatives are a significant technological innovation, but one that has unclear use cases and outcomes. Potential use cases are currently speculative and surrounded by uncertainty, hype and, in many cases, fraud and Ponzi schemes. The paper points to central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) as a key global innovation with perhaps the most significant transformative outcomes of blockchain technologies, despite not being based on such technology. It also points to the regulatory changes underway in response to these emerging technologies and calls for a continued roll‑out in regulatory and law enforcement capabilities to limit the risks and challenges posed by these technologies.

Geneva, SWIT: The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2022. 38p.

By Peter Tinti

Since 2013, the Republic of Mali has become a focal point of international efforts to stabilize the Sahel region through a mix of direct military intervention, security assistance, development aid and humanitarian support. A coup on 18 August 2020, and a subsequent consolidation of power by the ruling junta on 24 May 2021, combined with ongoing insecurity throughout the country’s centre and north, have prompted various international actors to reconsider their stabilization efforts in Mali. While mandates from international coalitions aim to restore stability, governance and security to the country, a misinterpretation of the relationship between violent extremism and organized crime has led to an emphasis on technical, militarized approaches that do not adequately consider consequential dynamics on the ground. This paper explains the risks of this approach for undermining stabilization efforts across the region and provides recommendations for: focusing analysis and policy on informal and criminal economies, rather than violent extremism; and adopting more development-focused interventions that better support Malian communities.

Geneva, SWIT: The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2022. 32p.

By Ivan Briscoe and David Keseberg

Legend has it that Pope John Paul II, during his visit to Guatemala at the height of that country’s civil war in 1983, handed down a highly undiplomatic refrain to his official hosts: “you like to kill.” It is a conclusion that, decades on from the Cold War era of military dictatorships, left-wing revolutionary regimes, and embattled democracies, is still largely valid across Latin America, although for quite different reasons. This is the region of the world that is now least affected by armed conflict, yet most exposed to a daily dose of largely criminal violence. In 2016, 17 of the 20 countries and 43 of the 50 cities with the world’s highest rates of homicide—excluding those affected by armed conflict—were to be found in Latin America.1 In absolute terms, one in four global homicides occurs in only four countries: Brazil, Mexico, Venezuela, and Colombia.2 This lethal yet commonplace violence is most closely associated with those countries saddled with the presence of vibrant criminal organizations, groups which are in turn associated in the minds of many Latin Americans with the spread of sinister tentacles across poor urban communities, peripheral rural areas, prisons, police forces, judges, eminences of the political establishment, and international bankers and lawyers. Crime no longer appears as a mere underworld, but has become a source of fear, resentment, popular entertainment and, perhaps most crucially, livelihood and opportunity; it has become a culture. ...

Prism, 8(1); 2019.

By  Steven Dudley, Parker Asmann and Victoria Dittmar 

In 2019, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP).1 What would become known as “remain in Mexico” was the latest in a decades-long effort by successive Republican and Democrat administrations to curb migration by making it increasingly difficult for migrants to enter and stay in the United States. However, the policies have had numerous unintended consequences, including bolstering criminal organizations along the US-Mexico border. Whereas the smuggling of drugs and weapons used to dominate the cross-border contraband trade, human smuggling has morphed into one of the most lucrative industries for crime groups. It also has made it increasingly dangerous for migrants who face more risks en route and along the US border. This report aims to highlight the role US policy has played in this transformation, which continues to evolve today. Specifically, it analyzes the ways in which Mexican organized crime groups have become involved in human smuggling as risks rose, prices surged, and migrants began to move through less-traveled corridors. The goal is to inform policymakers who are looking to address irregular migration and combat Mexico’s criminal organizations. ….  

Washington DC: Insight Crime, 2023. 22p.

By Eleanor Beevor 

In May 2022, two Nigerian citizens were arrested in Niamey, Niger, while trying to drive back to Nigeria in a stolen Toyota Corolla. The Corolla had a Nigerian licence plate, but police discovered that the car had recently been stolen from a Nigerien police officer. Fake military identification cards, and another Nigerian licence plate, were found in the car. The men were posing as Nigerian military officers. One had in fact been a former officer but was discharged in 2017 for desertion, and the other worked for Nigeria’s correctional service. After an investigation, it transpired that the men had left Nigeria three days before the arrest, and they had driven to Niamey in a stolen Toyota Hilux. The car, stolen in Nigeria, was resold in Niamey with the assistance of a Nigerien accomplice who was later arrested. It appears that this accomplice was also involved in the theft and resale of motorbikes, and possibly of other illicit commodities such as weapons. He was found with three AK-47 rifles and 151 cartridges, along with a stolen motorbike, other motorbike parts and three wristwatches. This example showcases many of the dynamics of car theft in the central Sahel region….

Geneva, SWIT::Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime , 2023.  38p.

 By Anastasia Austin and Douwe den Held 

The Dominican Republic prides itself on its openness to the world. As one of the first countries to open up during the COVID-19 pandemic, it seeks to be ever welcoming to tourism and business. But criminals may feel welcome as well. In this three-part series, InSight Crime dives into the infrastructure, the trafficking networks, and the corruption facilitating organized crime in the Dominican Republic.

Washington, DC, Insight Crime, 2022. 26p

United States. Executive Office Of The President; United States. Office Of National Drug Control Policy

From the document: "On April 12, 2023, Dr. Rahul Gupta, Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), formally designated fentanyl adulterated or associated with xylazine as an emerging drug threat, pursuant to 21 U.S.C. [United States Code] § 1708. [...] The emerging threat designation, made under the authority provided by 'The Substance Use-Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment (SUPPORT) for Patients and Communities Act of 2018' (P.L. [Public Law] 115-271), requires the Executive Branch to take several steps: First, ONDCP, in collaboration with relevant federal agencies, must draft and publicly issue a fentanyl adulterated or associated with xylazine Response Plan (within 90 days of designation). Second, ONDCP must issue Implementation Guidance to agencies (120 days after designation). Third, agencies must provide a specific Agency Implementation Report to ONDCP (180 days after designation). Fourth, ONDCP must publish a National Implementation Report on the Response Plan (in February 2024, with other ONDCP annual reports). The response plan presented here fulfills the first of these requirements and addresses urgent public health and safety needs. The SUPPORT Act also requires that the ONDCP Director decide whether a stand-alone national media campaign would be effective in addressing the emerging threat. In the case of xylazine-adulterated fentanyl, Director Gupta has determined that it will be productive to include such public messaging on fentanyl adulterants in existing campaigns and other federal messaging on fentanyl, in lieu of establishing a new stand-alone campaign focused solely on xylazine. The SUPPORT Act requires that an emerging threat response plan include evidence-based prevention, treatment, and supply reduction action steps, in addition to establishing goals and performance measures informed by comprehensive data. In the plan outlined below, we apply those requirements to the case of fentanyl adulterated or associated with xylazine and describe critically important and urgent next action steps."

United States. Executive Office of the President. United States. Office of National Drug Control Policy 2023. 15p.

By Camilla Fabbri https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4692-9646 camilla.fabbri@lshtm.ac.uk, Heidi Stöckl, […], and Cathy Zimmerman

Over the past decade, third-party labor recruiters who facilitate employment for migrant workers across low- and middle-income countries have often been considered by the counter-trafficking community as one of the main entry points into human trafficking. In response, anti-trafficking prevention programs have increasingly focused on addressing exploitative recruitment in migrants’ origin countries. Such programs may advocate for increased regulation of migration, greater enforcement actions against unlicensed recruiters, stricter ethical codes of conduct for recruiters and employers, and more pre-departure information about recruitment for migrants. Yet, there remains limited research about the relationship between prospective migrants, recruiters, and human trafficking, and the relative importance of third-party recruitment in the trafficking process. This Research Note draws on the world's largest database of individual victims of trafficking cases, the International Organization for Migration's (IOM) Global Victim of Trafficking Database (VoTD), to examine the role and characteristics of recruitment of trafficked victims. The VoTD contains information on nearly 50,000 trafficking victims who were registered for assistance from 2002 to June 2018. Our analysis shows that 94 percent of trafficked victims were recruited, in a broad sense (i.e., not only by third-party intermediaries). Additionally, the data presented here suggest that the relationship between recruitment and trafficking is complex and that forced labor is embedded within the wider structural issues around low-wage labor migration that lead to exploitative work conditions. Interventions to address human trafficking will benefit from strategies that target systemic issues constraining or harming low-wage labor. Further, these findings highlight the value of large-scale administrative datasets in migration research

  International Migration Review 2023, Vol. 57(2) 629-651  

Steven Dudley – Victoria Dittmar – Sara García, Jaime López-Aranda, Annie Pforzheimer, and Ben Westhoff

Precursor chemicals pose an unprecedented challenge for governments and multilateral organizations seeking to mitigate the development, manufacturing, production, and distribution of illicit synthetic drugs. As opposed to most legacy drugs -- which rely on plants, harvests, favorable weather, significant and varied manual labor, and transport of bulk amounts of illicit substances across heavily-policed terrain -- synthetic drugs can be produced in laboratories all year-round using a wide variety of mostly sparsely or unevenly regulated chemicals, which can be employed at different stages of the process in rudimentary laboratories and transported in large or small amounts, often without the knowledge of the transporters themselves. The sources for these chemicals span the globe. They are currently concentrated in China, where a relatively small number of companies appear to be producing precursor chemicals, in mainly two provinces. These chemicals are marketed and sold on the internet, where an army of online providers offer well-regulated and unregulated chemicals via the Clearnet and the dark web. These marketers are sometimes extensions of these same production companies and sometimes independent. Some are also clans, which appear to own numerous production and marketing companies. The precursors are transported to Mexico via cargo ships or air cargo, traveling direct or via circuitous routes. Cargo is often mislabeled, camouflaging the contents, purpose, or amount of their shipment. In Mexico, brokers and independent buyers facilitate this trade, filing paperwork, creating fictitious companies, or bribing officials.

• More...

  The chemicals then make their way to small producers. Often referred to as “cooks,” these producers synthesize the precursors into illicit synthetic drugs that are then sold to large buyers and transport specialists. Two large criminal networks buy and move synthetic drugs in bulk: the Sinaloa Cartel and Jalisco Cartel New Generation (Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación – CJNG). These networks are responsible for bringing this product across the most difficult part of its journey and thus charge a premium for their services. After they sell the drugs wholesale, they are largely absent, leaving the distribution and retail sales to other local criminal networks. The precursor industry -- and the synthetic drug industry writ large -- is so challenging to disrupt precisely because it works across legal and illegal spheres, involves many layers and different criminal networks, and has many means to obtain its final objective: the sale of synthetic drugs to an increasing number of consumers. …

Washington, DC: InSight Crime, 2023. 147p.

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 Pia Johansson Heinsvig, Ask Vest Christiansen, Daniel Ayoubi, Laura Smedegaard Heisel, Christian Lindhols

This study examines doping products seized by the police in three regional police districts in Denmark from December 2019 to December 2020. The products, often referred to as performance and image-enhancing drugs (PIEDs), are described in relation to the country of origin, manufacturing company, and the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) stated on the packaging versus the one identified by subsequent chemical analysis. The study also includes a description of the degree of professionalism by which the products appear according to EU requirements. A total of 764 products were seized during the study period. The products originate from 37 countries, mainly located in Asia (37%), Europe (23%), and North America (13%). One hundred ninety-three different manufacturing companies could be identified from the product packaging. The most frequent compound class was the androgenic anabolic steroids, found in 60% of the products. In 25%–34% of the products, either no or an incorrect API relative to the one stated on the product was found. However, only 7%–10% contain either no API or a compound from a different compound class than the one stated. Most products had a professional appearance fulfilling most EU requirements for packaging information. The study shows that many different companies supply PIEDs to the Danish market and that counterfeit and substandard products are widespread. Many products do, however, appear professional to the user giving an impression of a high-quality product. Although many products are substandard, they most often contain an API from the same compound class as the one labeled.

Drug Testing and Analysis Volume 15, Issue 6Jun 2023, Pages 595-705

By The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)

The World Drug Report 2023 comes as countries are struggling at the halfway point to revive stalled progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Crises and conflict continue to inflict untold suffering and deprivation, with the number of people forcibly displaced globally hitting a new record high of 110 million. Peace, justice and human rights, which should be the birthright of all, remain out of reach for far too many. The harms caused by drug trafficking and illicit drug economies are contributing to and compounding many of these threats, from instability and violence to environmental devastation. Illicit drug markets continue to expand in terms of harm as well as scope, from the growing cocaine supply and drug sales on social media platforms to the relentless spread of synthetic drugs – cheap and easy to manufacture anywhere in the world, and in the case of fentanyl, deadly in the smallest of doses. Drug use disorders are harming health, including mental health, safety and well-being. Stigma and discrimination make it less likely that people who use drugs will get the help they need. Fewer than 20 per cent of people with drug use disorders are in treatment, and access is highly unequal. Women account for almost half the people who use amphetamine-type stimulants, but only 27 per cent of those receiving treatment. Controlled drugs needed for palliative care and pain relief, namely pharmaceutical opioids, are denied to those who desperately need them, with too little access in many countries – mainly low- and middle-income countries, where some 86 per cent of the world’s population lives. Drug challenges pose difficult policy dilemmas that cannot be addressed by any one country or region alone. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime publishes the World Drug Report every year to provide a global perspective and overview of the world drug problem, offering impartial evidence with the aim of supporting dialogue and shared responses. This edition of the World Drug Report highlights the growing complexity of evolving drug threats. A special chapter explores how illicit drug economies intersect with crimes that affect the environment and insecurity in the Amazon Basin, with impoverished rural populations and Indigenous groups paying the price. Other sections of the report explore urgent challenges, including drug use in humanitarian settings, drugs in conflict situations and the changing dynamics of synthetic drug markets. The report also delves into new clinical trials involving psychedelics, medical use of cannabis and innovations in drug treatment and other services.   

New York: United Nations, 2023. 70p.

By United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)

The booklet opens with a look at the challenges posed to law enforcement by synthetic drugs, both in terms of their increasing potency, adaptability and ease of manufacture and their shorter supply chains, reduced risk and lower production costs compared with drugs of natural origin. Other law enforcement challenges are considered in the context of the increasing use of social media for buying and selling drugs online.
Booklet 2 also examines approaches to regulating the medical cannabis market in different countries and assesses recent developments surrounding the therapeutic, spiritual and non-medical use of substances known as “psychedelics”. The remainder of the booklet focuses on issues related to drugs in specific contexts, including the Amazon Basin, where the convergence of drug crime and crimes that affect the environment poses a threat to natural and human ecosystems. The risk factors for and vulnerability to substance use disorders among forcibly displaced populations are also discussed in the booklet, and the interim outcomes of innovations and modifications of services for people who use drugs during the COVID-19 pandemic are summarized.

New York: United Nations,  2023. 205p.

By Joseph Friedman , George Karandinos, Laurie Kain Hart, Fernando Montero Castrillo, Nicholas Graetz, and Philippe Bourgois

Background. The United States is experiencing a continuing crisis of gun violence, and economically marginalized and racially segregated inner-city areas are among the most affected. To decrease this violence, public health interventions must engage with the complex social factors and structural drivers—especially with regard to the clandestine sale of narcotics—that have turned the neighborhood streets of specific vulnerable subgroups into concrete killing fields. Here we present a mixed-methods ethnographic and epidemiological assessment of narcotics-driven firearm violence in Philadelphia’s impoverished, majority Puerto Rican neighborhoods….Findings. Even controlling for poverty levels, impoverished majority-Puerto Rican areas in Philadelphia are exposed to significantly higher levels of gun violence than majority-white or black neighborhoods. Our mixed methods data suggest that this reflects the unique social position of these neighborhoods as a racial meeting ground in deeply segregated Philadelphia, which has converted them into a retail endpoint for the sale of astronomical levels of narcotics.

PLOS One:  November 21, 2019

By Miriam Cavazos Hernandez and Balasurya Sivakumar

We examine the effect of natural resource shocks on violence by drug cartels at the municipality level in rural Mexico from 2003 to 2017. For this, we use an Instrumental Variable setup by instrumenting our main explanatory variable vegetation density with rainfall. Vegetation density is an indicator for natural resource shocks and reflects the “greenness” in a particular area which is considered as an indicator of land productivity. Our main finding is that negative shocks in vegetation density increase homicides. This negative shock could imply crop failures resulting in bad economic outcomes for people in rural areas thereby pushing people to engage with violent drug cartels. Additionally, in order to confirm the main results we explore possible effects that natural resource shocks have on drug cartel presence, seizure of illegal drugs and other drug-related criminal activities. These results further confirm the negative relationship between natural resource shocks and violence by drug cartels. Our findings highlight the dynamics in the operation of the drug cartels and are relevant for understanding the determinants of conflict in rural Mexico.   

Lund, Sweden: Lund University, 2022. 48p.

By Carolina Sampó · Valeska Troncoso

  This article presents the results of an exploratory study aimed to analyze the contexts in which the use of Non-Traditional ports of cocaine departure and counterintuitive routes is prioritized, based on the experience of Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay. Moreover, we show that criminal organizations prioritize the Ports of Buenos Aires, San Antonio and Montevideo, and the counter-intuitive routes that lead to them, because they are spaces that generate incentives linked to the porosity of borders, the lack of control at the ports, and the possibility of exploiting the country’s lack of reputation for drug exportation to re-export cocaine undetected. This study constitutes a precedent for future research on the role of South American Southern Cone ports in cocaine trafficking. We can identify at least four emerging lines of research: 1. Cocaine trafficking from landlocked countries; 2. The role of the waterway Paraná-Paraguay; 3. The link between Non-Traditional ports of cocaine departure and new markets; and 4. Other Non-Traditional Ports of cocaine departure, which are not containerized.

Trends in Organized Crime, 2022.