All that glitters is not gold. Gold is the new cocaine - and it's just as lucrative, dangerous, and destructive.

Dirty Gold is a searing expose on the booming gold mining industry and destruction on the land and people of Latin America. It looks closely at a small US firm in Miami that helped transform the city into the nation's No.1 importer of gold into the United States. The book follows the meteoric rise and fall of a group of drug traders known as 'the three amigos' who laundered narco money through gold illegally brought into the US and raked in millions before they were caught.

Whilst they were making their millions, the humanitarian situation in Colombia, Peru, and many other countries deteriorated dramatically.

What is more profitable than cocaine, heroin, marijuana or guns? Illegally trafficked cigarettes . . .

Reputable tobacco companies have – for decades – been complicit in cigarette smuggling. In this gripping exposé, former SARS lawyer Telita Snyckers uncovers the dark underbelly of the tobacco industry.

She recounts the instances where big tobacco itself was caught redhanded and explores not only why a listed company would want to smuggle its own product, but also how it was done.

Discover the secret history behind the headlines.

The Mexican drug wars have inspired countless articles, TV shows and movies. From Breaking Bad to Sicario, El Chapo's escapes to Trump's tirades, this is a story we think we know. But there's a hidden history to the biggest story of the twenty-first century. The Dope exposes how an illicit industry that started with farmers, families and healers came to be dominated by cartels, kingpins and corruption. Benjamin T Smith traces an unforgettable cast of characters from the early twentieth century to the modern day, whose actions came to influence Mexico as we now know it.

There's Enrique Fernandez, the borderlands trafficker who became Mexico's first major narco and one of the first victims of the war on drugs; Eduardo 'Lalo' Fernandez, Mexico's most prominent heroin chemist and first major cocaine importer; Leopoldo Salazar Viniegra, the brilliant doctor and Marxist who tried (and failed) to decriminalize Mexico's drugs; and Harry Anslinger, the head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics whose sensationalist strategies paved the way for U.S. interference and the extraordinary levels of violence in Mexico today.

The Dope is the epic saga of how violence and corruption came to plague modern Mexico, and the first book to make sense of the political and economic big picture of the Mexican drug wars.

This is South Africa, home to cutthroat gangs and a lair to some of the world's most notorious drug lords who seem to view the country as a buffer from prosecution.

It's easy to see why politics has pummelled policing, first in the form of apartheid and then under Jacob Zuma's presidency when state corruption exploded, and intelligence structures imploded. Tons of illicit drugs are pumped across the borders annually. This bleeds into other crimes including terrorism, arms dealing, kidnapping and extortion. Add hardened homespawned gangs to this toxic mix, and the combination is lethal.

An array of local and foreign names surface when prodding this volatile matrix. Among them is one of India's most wanted, Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar, accused of partnering with the Taliban, and self-confessed drug trafficking mastermind Vaygiri Goswami who claims to have helped finance the ANC. Then there is Brazilian tracking accused Gilberto Aparecido dos Santos, and Cuban kingpin Nelson Pablo Yester-Garrido, who purportedly had a soft spot for Nelson Mandela.

For true-crime diehard fans, this one is for you.

In the 1990s, deep-cover police agent RS536 took on the Durban underworld as part of a new organised crime intelligence unit. He rubbed shoulders with drug lords, smugglers and corrupt cops, and was instrumental in busting an international drug ring and foiling a bank heist, among many other dangerous engagements.

But then, as the country’s new democracy birthed a struggle between the old and the new guard in the South African Police Service, his identity and his life came under threat. In this action-packed account, Johann van Loggerenberg describes how, as a young policeman, he worked closely with the investigative team of the Goldstone Commission to uncover the ‘third force’ – apartheid security forces that supplied weapons to the Inkatha Freedom Party to destabilise the country.

He also delves into how and why, at the height of state capture at the South African Revenue Service in 2014, he was falsely accused of being an apartheid spy, a lie that persists up to today. Here, finally, is the truth behind deep-cover police agent RS536.

You will find a real life, gritty account of drug addiction in the pages of Rocks – One Man’s Climb from Drugs to Dreams.

Set in the leafy suburbs of Joburg in the 90s, and at the height of the Johannesburg Rave Culture, this book brings to life the agonising heartache of the drug addicted Marco Broccardo, and that of his family members including the dirty details of the daily life of an addict – the close encounters with the law, moments of insanity and rock bottom desperation. But amidst all the despair, there is a moment of liberation and hope. Hope that addiction can be beaten through the right decisions and the over-arching idea of love.

This book will take you on a journey – from the despair of being rock bottom to the elation of the mountain-tops of Kilimanjaro.

Analysing one of the most controversial areas in public policy, this pioneering Research Handbook brings together contributions from expert researchers to provide a global overview of the shifting dynamics of drug policy. Chapters tackle a complex and cross-cutting issue from inter and multi-disciplinary perspectives, incorporating political science, history, law and public health into their analyses. Emphasising connections between the domestic and the international, this timely Research Handbook illustrates the intersections between drug policy, human rights obligations and the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. Integrating detailed discussion of ever-evolving drug markets, a diverse range of policy responses, and political and ideological tensions, the contributors offer an insightful analysis of the regional dynamics of drug control, its historic constructions, and the contemporary and emerging problems it is facing. Aimed at researchers and students interested in drug policy, as well as policy makers and practitioners at different levels of governance, the Research Handbook on International Drug Policy provides a much-needed comparative approach and will prove to be an essential resource for navigating the difficulties surrounding drug policy and control.

Shortlisted for the 2022 Jhalak Prize Shortlisted for the 2022 Desmond Elliott Prize Shortlisted for the 2022 British Book Awards, Book of the Year - Discover Award Longlisted for the 2022 Gordon Burn Prize Longlisted for the 2022 Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize Winner of a 2022 Somerset Maugham Award Cabbages . . . The Turkish variety are prized for their enlarged leaf bud, that's where we put the heroin . . . There's a stash of heroin waiting to be imported, and no one seems sure what to do with it . . . But Ayla's a gardener, and she has a plan. Offering a fresh and funny take on the machinery of the North London heroin trade, Keeping the House lifts the lid on a covert world thriving just beneath notice: not only in McDonald's queues and men's clubs, but in spotless living rooms and whispering kitchens. Spanning three generations, this is the story of the women who keep their family - and their family business - afloat, juggling everything from police surveillance to trickier questions of community, belonging and love.

'Packed with insights and details that will both amaze and appal you' - Oliver Bullough, author of Butler to the World Across the world, HSBC likes to sell itself as 'the world's local bank', the friendly face of corporate and personal finance. And yet, a decade ago, the same bank was hit with a record US fine of $1.9 billion for facilitating money laundering for 'drug kingpins and rogue nations'. In pursuit of their goal of becoming the biggest bank in the world, between 2003 to 2010, HSBC allowed El Chapo and the Sinaloa cartel, one of the most notorious and murderous criminal organizations in the world, to turn its ill-gotten money into clean dollars and thereby grow one of the deadliest drugs empires the world has ever seen. How did a bank, which boasts 'we're committed to helping protect the world's financial system on which millions of people depend, by only doing business with customers who meet our high standards of transparency' come to facilitate Mexico's richest drug baron? And how did a bank that had been named 'one of the best-run organizations in the world' become so entwined with one of the most barbaric groups of gangsters on the planet? Too Big to Jail is an extraordinary story brilliantly told by writer, commentator, and former editor of The Independent, Chris Blackhurst, that starts in Hong Kong and ranges across London, Washington, the Cayman Islands and Mexico, where HSBC saw the opportunity to become the largest bank in the world, and El Chapo seized the chance to fuel his murderous empire by laundering his drug proceeds through the bank. It brings together an extraordinary cast of politicians, bankers, drug dealers, FBI officers and whistle-blowers, and asks what price does greed have? Whose job is it to police global finance? And why did not a single person go to prison for facilitating the murderous expansion of a global drug empire?

The biggest drug bust in British history occurred in the early hours of 25 March 1977: 800 officers made 120 arrests and seized a staggering 6,000,000 tabs of LSD. The raids focused on two acid manufacturing centres: one hidden in an isolated farmhouse in deepest Wales, the other in a suburban house on a leafy residential street in south-west London. Between them they supplied acid to most of the UK, Europe, America and beyond. Tabs bearing their logo were recovered as far away as Australia. James Wyllie tells the extraordinary story of how a middle-aged American academic, two idealistic British students, a public school cad and an American hustler formed the Microdot Gang and created an acid production line designed to turn on the world. It is the story of Operation Julie - a police operation unprecedented in scale, sophistication and complexity, the brainchild of an old-school detective who led an investigation that would eventually involve the security services, the FBI, the DEA, the Canadian authorities and the Swiss police. Ranging over a decade and across several continents, The Microdot Gang is also a tale of how a cultural movement became a criminal enterprise, inspiring the war on drugs and launching a revolution that left an enduring and complex legacy.

NOW WITH A NEW AFTERWORD, THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND THE SOURCE OF THE VIRAL TED TALK

'Screamingly addictive' STEPHEN FRY

'Superb ... Thrilling story-telling' NAOMI KLEIN

'A powerful contribution to an urgent debate' GUARDIAN

What if everything we've been told about addiction is wrong? One of Johann Hari's earliest memories is of trying to wake up one of his relatives and not being able to. As he grew older, he realised there was addiction in his family. Confused, he set out on a three-year, thirty-thousand mile journey to discover what really causes addiction - and how to solve it.

Told through a series of gripping human stories, this book was the basis of a TED talk and animation that have been viewed more than twenty million times. It has transformed the global debate about addiction.

Across the world, HSBC likes to sell itself as 'the world's local bank', the friendly face of corporate and personal finance. And yet, a decade ago, the same bank was hit with a record US fine of $1.9 billion for facilitating money laundering for 'drug kingpins and rogue nations'. In pursuit of their goal of becoming the biggest bank in the world, between 2003 to 2010, HSBC allowed El Chapo and the Sinaloa cartel, one of the most notorious and murderous criminal organizations in the world, to turn its ill-gotten money into clean dollars and thereby grow one of the deadliest drugs empires the world has ever seen. Just how did 'the world's local bank' find itself enabling Mexico's leading drugs cartel, and the biggest drugs trafficking organization in the world, to launder cash through the bank's branch network and systems? How did a bank, which boasts 'we're committed to helping protect the world's financial system on which millions of people depend, by only doing business with customers who meet our high standards of transparency' come to facilitate Mexico's richest drug baron? And how did a bank that as recently as 2002 had been named 'one of the best-run organizations in the world' become so entwined with such a criminal, with one of the most barbaric groups of gangsters on the planet? Too Big to Jail is an extraordinary story brilliantly told by writer, commentator and former editor of The Independent, Chris Blackhurst, that starts in Hong Kong and ranges across London, Washington, the Cayman Islands and Mexico, where HSBC saw the opportunity to become the largest bank in the world, and El Chapo seized the chance to fuel his murderous empire by laundering his drug proceeds through the bank. It brings together an extraordinary cast of politicians, bankers, drug dealers, FBI officers and whistle-blowers, and asks what price does greed have? Whose job is it to police global finance? And why did not a single person go to prison for facilitating the murderous expansion of a global drug empire? Are some corporations now so big as to be above the law?

Forty years in, the War on Drugs has done almost nothing to prevent drugs from being sold or used, but it has nonetheless created a little-known surveillance state in America's most disadvantaged neighborhoods. Alice Goffman spent six years living in one such neighborhood in Philadelphia, and her close observations and often harrowing stories reveal the pernicious effects of this pervasive policing. Goffman introduces us to an unforgettable cast of young African American men who are caught up in this web of warrants and surveillance - some of them small-time drug dealers, others just ordinary guys dealing with limited choices. All find the web of presumed criminality, built as it is on the very associations and friendships that make up a life, nearly impossible to escape. While Goffman does not deny the problems of the drug trade, and the violence that often accompanies it, through her gripping accounts of daily life in the forgotten neighborhoods of America's cities, she makes it impossible for us to ignore the very real human costs of our failed response - the blighting of entire neighborhoods, and the needless sacrifice of whole generations.

The Business Secrets of Drug Dealing tells the story of a hyper-observant, politically-minded, but humorously pragmatic weed dealer who has spent a working life compiling rules for how to a) make money and b) avoid prison. Each rule shapes a chapter of this fast-paced outlaw tale, all delivered in Huey Carmichael's deliciously trenchant argot. Here are a few of them: No guns but keep shooters. Stay behind the white guy. Don't snitch. Always have a job. Be multi-sourced. Get your money and get out. Part edge-of-the-seat suspense story, part how-to manual in the tradition of The Anarchist Cookbook, The Business Secrets of Drug Dealing is as scintillating as it is subversive. Just reading it feels illegal.

A new and updated edition of Malcolm Beith's thrilling inside-account of Joaquin El Chapo Guzman's notorious Sinaloa drug cartel. Until 2016, the dense hills of Sinaloa, Mexico, were home to the most powerful drug lord since Pablo Escobar: Joaquin El Chapo Guzman. Guzman was among the word's ten most wanted men and appeared on Forbes magazine's billionaire list. With his massive wealth, his army of professional killers, and a network of informants that reached into the highest levels of government, catching Guzman was considered impossible - until it wasn't. Newsweek correspondent Malcolm Beith has spent years reporting on the drug wars and followed the chase with full access to senior officials and exclusive interviews with soldiers and drug traffickers in the region, including members of Guzman's cartel. Newly updated with Beith's gripping account of the trial that put Guzman away for life, The Last Narco is essential reading about one of the most dramatic news stories of our day - a true-crime thriller happening in real-time.

The war on drugs has failed, but consensus in the international drug policy debate on the way forward is missing. Amidst this moment of uncertainty, militarised lenses on the global illicit drug problem continue to neglect the complexity of the causes and consequences that this war is intended to defend or defeat. Challenging conventional thinking in defence and security sectors, Transforming the War on Drugs constitutes the first comprehensive and systematic effort to theoretically, conceptually, and empirically investigate the impacts of the war on drugs. The contributors trace the consequences of the war on drugs across vulnerable regions, including South America and Central America, West Africa, the Middle East and the Golden Crescent, the Golden Triangle, and Russia. It demonstrates that these consequences are 'glocal'. The war's local impacts on human rights, security, development, and public health are interdependent with transnational illicit flows. The book further reveals how these impacts have influenced the positions of governments across these regions, with significant ramifications for the international drug control regime. Crucially, it shows that, at a time when global order is in flux, critically evaluating the regime's securitisation through the war on drugs provides key insights into other global governance realms.

The book takes a hard hitting look at the drug wars taking place in Mexico between competing gangs, cartels, and mercenary factions; their insurgency against the Mexican state; the narco-violence and terrorism that is increasingly coming over the border into the United States, and its interrelationship with domestic prison and street gangs. Analysis and response strategies are provided by leading writers on 3GEN gang theory, counterterrorism, transnational organized crime, and homeland security. Narcos Over the Border is divided into three sections: narco-opposing force (NARCO OPFOR) organization and technology use; patterns of violence and corruption and the illicit economy; and United States response strategies. The work also includes short introductory essays, a strategic threat overview, an afterword and selected references. Specific topics covered include: advanced weaponry, internet use, kidnappings and assassinations, torture, beheadings, and occultism, cartel and gang evolutionary patterns, drug trafficking, street taxation, corruption, and border firefights. This book was published as a special issue of Small Wars and Insurgencies.

Combining a compulsive read with rigorous academic analysis, this book tells the real-life stories of drug dealers involved in county lines networks, including their methods, motives and misfortunes. Conventional wisdom surrounding county lines often portrays drugs runners as exploited victims and gang proliferation as a market-driven exercise, and suggests a business model facilitated exclusively by smart phone technology and routinely regulated by violence. Aimed at students, scholars, practitioners and policymakers, this myth-busting, accessible book offers a novel way of thinking about county lines in relation to gangs and serious organised crime and presents new ideas for drug crime prevention, intervention and enforcement.

The 'ndrangheta - the Calabrian region of Italy's mafia - is one of wealthiest and most powerful criminal organizations today. It is considered Italy's most powerful mafia; it's not only the main object of concern for anti-mafia units in Italy, but also for joint investigative teams in Europe and beyond. Combining autobiography, travel ethnography, memoir, academic rigour and investigative journalism, this book provides a global outlook on the 'ndrangheta, taking the reader to small villages and locations in Italy and abroad to Australia, Canada, United States and Argentina.

'Unique and engaging characters woven into the fabric of a fantastic plot. Jason Dean is one to watch' Marc Cameron, New York Times bestselling author of Tom Clancy Code of Honor What is a death sentence to a dead man?He was a man with many names. Moving from country to country, changing his face constantly so as to remain in the shadows, he was nothing more than a ghost. For now, he is known simply as Korso. A covert salvage operative, he recovers lost artefacts and items, often stolen, for rich benefactors unable to operate through normal channels. But his shadowy existence is shattered upon the arrival at his Bermuda home of the man he had hoped never to see again... Tasked with recovering a missing, one-of-a-kind shipment in only four days, his elite skill set will be tested to its limits. Failure will result in his identity being revealed to his former boss, the ruthless Nikolic, who would stop at nothing to eliminate the one man who walked away from his organisation. An exceptional, white-knuckle thriller full of intrigue and suspense, perfect for fans of Rob Sinclair, Mark Dawson and Adam Hamdy. Praise for Tracer 'Tracer, Korso's first outing, is everything you could want in a thriller; fast-pace, suspense, mystery, just the right amount of wickedness, but above all else a protagonist who the reader will want to read more and more of. A real page turner' Rob Sinclair, million copy bestselling author of The Red Cobra 'Meet Korso, a mysterious and unique character you won't be able to get enough of. In a thriller novel I want tension, pace and ample action, and in Tracer, Jason Dean has delivered by the bucketful' Matt Hilton, author of the Joe Hunter thrillers 'A relentless round of fast and furious set pieces, out-pacing Reacher for tension and with non-stop violence and intrigue to satisfy any thriller fans' Adrian Magson, author of The Watchman 'A thrilling, race-against-time ride ... a great start to what I'm sure will be a hugely successful thriller series' A. A. Chaudhuri, author of The Scribe 'The most explosive book I've read in ages' D. L. Marshall, author of Anthrax Island 'A superb, fast-paced thriller which literally ticks like a time-bomb' Nick Oldham, author of the Henry Christie series

'This conceptually vivid book refreshes our vision' - Ruth Wilson Gilmore The word smuggler often unleashes a simplified, negative image painted by the media and the authorities. Such state-centric perspectives hide many social, political and economic relations generated by smuggling. This book looks at the practice through the eyes of the smugglers, revealing how their work can be productive, subversive and deeply sociopolitical. By tracing the illegalised movement of people and goods across borders, Seeing Like a Smuggler shows smuggling as a contradiction within the nation-state system, and in a dialectical relation with the national order of things. It raises questions on how smuggling engages and unsettles the ethics, materialities, visualities, histories and the colonial power relations that form borders and bordering. Covering a wide spectrum of approaches from personal reflections and ethnographies to historical accounts, cultural analysis and visual essays, the book spans the globe from Colombia to Ethiopia, Singapore to Guatemala, Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, and from Kurdistan to Bangladesh, to show how people deal with global inequalities and the restrictions of poverty and immobility.

'This conceptually vivid book refreshes our vision' - Ruth Wilson Gilmore The word smuggler often unleashes a simplified, negative image painted by the media and the authorities. Such state-centric perspectives hide many social, political and economic relations generated by smuggling. This book looks at the practice through the eyes of the smugglers, revealing how their work can be productive, subversive and deeply sociopolitical. By tracing the illegalised movement of people and goods across borders, Seeing Like a Smuggler shows smuggling as a contradiction within the nation-state system, and in a dialectical relation with the national order of things. It raises questions on how smuggling engages and unsettles the ethics, materialities, visualities, histories and the colonial power relations that form borders and bordering. Covering a wide spectrum of approaches from personal reflections and ethnographies to historical accounts, cultural analysis and visual essays, the book spans the globe from Colombia to Ethiopia, Singapore to Guatemala, Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, and from Kurdistan to Bangladesh, to show how people deal with global inequalities and the restrictions of poverty and immobility.

'Michael is living proof that love always has the power to bring you home.' Charlie Mackesy 'A cracking read. Really gets to the bottom of the madness of a man fighting his demons.' Ray Winstone 'His life may have had its ups and downs, but it is wonderful example of God's transforming power.' Nicky Gumbel, Vicar of HTB & pioneer of ALPHA 'Take it from me, Michael got up to some mischief. And to find some peace at the end of it all! You really need to hear this story.' Former London Crime Boss Growing up, Michael wanted nothing more than to follow in his dad's footsteps and join the family business. Aged 18, he did just that and entered into the glamourous, dangerous world of organised crime. Michael's father, a career criminal and contemporary of the infamous Krays, was a wayward role model. Soon Michael's criminal activities were funding a reckless lifestyle of drugs, sex, and violence. But the high couldn't last. In 1993 both men were arrested for their involvement in a GBP13-million smuggling operation. Michael was sentenced to twelve years, serving time in the same prison as his dad. Inside HMP Exeter, Michael found something he had never expected: answers. A chance encounter in the prison chapel led to an experience that would shake the foundations of his life. This is a true story of trauma and transformation, one man's search for redemption, and the struggle to become the father he never had.

In this succinct text, Jonathan D. Rosen and Hanna Samir Kassab explore the linkage between weak institutions and government policies designed to combat drug trafficking, organized crime, and violence in Latin America. Using quantitative analysis to examine criminal violence and publicly available survey data from the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) to conduct regression analysis, individual case studies on Colombia, Mexico, El Salvador, and Nicaragua highlight the major challenges that governments face and how they have responded to various security issues. Rosen and Kassab later turn their attention to the role of external criminal actors in the region and offer policy recommendations and lessons learned. Questions explored include: What are the major trends in organized crime in this country? How has organized crime evolved over time? Who are the major criminal actors? How has state fragility contributed to organized crime and violence (and vice versa)? What has been the government's response to drug trafficking and organized crime? Have such policies contributed to violence? Crime, Violence and the State in Latin America is suitable to both undergraduate and graduate courses in criminal justice, international relations, political science, comparative politics, international political economy, organized crime, drug trafficking, and violence.