The Informer

In February 2021, as a result of an operation involving the decryption of Sky ECC, a communications system used by organised crime organisations, customs authorities in northern Europe collectively seized the largest cocaine shipment ever recorded. German officials seized a total of 16 tonnes of cocaine disguised in wall filler at the port of…

Jamaica’s criminal trajectory has long stimulated the curiosity of criminologists and policy makers, and now, we are beginning to see how pervasive the crime-politics nexus is and the ways in which it gave rise to criminal gangs in the country. In Kingston, the construction of a public housing complex and…

It must have been July 27th, 2012 or at the latest 2013, in Limbadi, a small town in the Vibonese province in Calabria, that on this day every year celebrates the patron Saint. When the Saint exits the church, I am sure that many – including myself – are wondering…

To date, female actors within organised crime structures have remained invisible. With the exception of well-known women who have inherited illicit businesses and operations from their jailed or deceased male family members – such as Mexicans Clara Elena Laborín Archuleta, wife of Héctor Beltrán Leyva (arrested in 2014), or Enedina Arellano Félix,…

Police are not police and the law is not the law everywhere, one must be reminded, as I strolled through the hallowed centrepiece of Interpol’s Lyonnais HQ, having transposed myself from Singapore to assist in the presentation of a global gathering of law enforcement and others. This was quite a few years after leaving…

As the UK establishes its post-Brexit independent sanctions regime, the potential to use sanctions against serious and organised crime has attracted growing attention. To add value, any move in this direction requires a clear strategy as to how sanctions would complement existing law enforcement tools. Recent months have seen the…

Following the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) declaration of the Covid-19 pandemic in March, Italy was one of the first countries to implement extreme measures in an attempt to contain the drastic impact of the pandemic. With the domestic health system on the verge of collapse, restrictions to movement were imposed across the…

In recent evidence to a House of Lords committee examining United Kingdom (UK) policy in Afghanistan, Defence Minister Baroness Goldie warned that the Afghan narcotics trade, which accounts for approximately 85 per cent of global heroin, poses ‘a key threat to our national security interests.’ The threat, she argued, was multifaceted: ‘95 per…

Although not new, the creation of illicit economies by organised crime has swiftly become an ever-present phenomenon in the 21st century. Criminal groups have diversified economically into the lucrative business of, for instance, logging in various countries of Latin America, the exploitation and trade in wildlife in countries in Africa, charcoal trade in Somalia, oil theft in Nigeria and…

This paper draws on the insights and feedback from John Cusack, Chair, Global Coalition to Fight Financial Crime; Alexandria Reid, Research Fellow, Royal United Services Institute (RUSI); Jon Godson, Assistant Director, International Air Transport Association (IATA); and Che Sidanius, Global Head of Financial Crime and Industry Affairs, Refinitiv. You can…