Los Zetas represent a new generation of ruthless, sadistic pragmatists in Mexico and Central America who are impelling a tectonic shift among drug trafficking organizations in the Americas. Mexico's marines have taken down the cartel's top leaders; nevertheless, these capos and their desperados have forever altered how criminal business is conducted in the Western Hemisphere. This narrative brings an unprecedented level of detail in describing how Los Zetas became Mexico's most diabolical criminal organization before suffering severe losses.

In their heyday, Los Zetas controlled networks of American police, politicians, judges, and businessmen. The Mexican government is losing its "war on drugs," despite the military, technical, and intelligence resources provided by its northern neighbor. Subcontracted street gangs operate in hundreds of US cities, purchasing weapons, delivering product, executing targeted foes, and bribing the US Border Patrol. Despite crippling losses Los Zetas still dominate Nuevo Laredo, the major portal for legal and illegal bilateral commerce. They also work hand-in-glove with the underworld in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, as well as with gangs like the Maras Salvatruchas.

This Palgrave Pivot forms the final part of Andreff's trilogy reviewing the economic aspects of criminal behaviour in sports. In this volume, Andreff focuses on the most economically significant manipulations jeopardising the future of current, modern, sport: rigged online sport betting and doping. The former is framed as a new business undertaken by global criminal networks linked to economic globalisation, whilst the latter discusses empirical evidence, definitions, regulations and various regional and sporting case studies. Andreff summarises by using game theory to propose a new incentive scheme that could act as a solution for addressing such criminal activity in future. Volumes I and II (available separately) address Sport Manipulations and Corruption in Sport respectively. This book will be of interest to students, researchers and journalists in sports science, sports management and sports economics.

Organized Crime: From the Mob to Transnational Organized Crime, Seventh Edition, provides readers with a clear understanding of organized crime, including its definition and causes, how it is categorized under the law, models to explain its persistence, and the criminal justice response to organized crime, including investigation, prosecution, defense, and sentencing. This book offers a comprehensive survey, including an extensive history of the Mafia in the United States; a legal analysis of the offenses that underlie organized crimes; specific attention to modern manifestations of organized crime activity, such as human smuggling, Internet crimes, and other transnational criminal operations; and the application of ethics to the study of organized crime. A new section has been added on threat assessment in organized crime. Chapters are enhanced by updated photos, tables, charts, and critical thinking exercises that help students apply concepts to actual organized crime cases. Every chapter includes two student-friendly special features: Organized Crime Biography and Organized Crime at the Movies. A glossary gives students a quick reference for looking up important definitions of organized crime-related terms, and a Timeline of Organized Crime in the United States highlights important events in the history of organized crime.

This multidisciplinary Handbook examines the complex and often hidden relationship between organised crime and politics across the globe, highlighting the difficulties involved in researching such relationships and offering new insights into how they evolve to become pervasive and destructive. Organised into five distinct sections, key chapters focus on issues and case studies from across Europe, the Americas, Africa, Eurasia and international organisations in order to provide a new and systematic picture and analysis of what the relationship between criminal organisations and politics looks like in different national contexts. In so doing, it offers an insight into the ever-evolving nature of this relationship, and the exchanges within it, in order to identify common features and key differences. These in turn raise provoking questions regarding the possibility of improving democracy, political systems, civil society and economic systems in order to counter the possible infiltration of these organisations, their associates and representatives. Students and scholars of public policy, politics, criminology and those focussing on organised crime more specifically will find this Handbook an original and engaging guide to the current state of play, whilst policy makers, practitioners and NGOs will find the case studies set in national context eminently valuable. Contributors include: S. Adorno, F. Allum, J. Arsovska, M. Beare, M. Bedetti, G. Borrelli, S. Brady, D. Bright, J.-L. Briquet, A. Chung, N. Dalponte, A. De Vos, C.N. Dias, S. Dinnen, G. Favarel-Garrigues, J. Gilbert, S. Gilmour, C. Gunnarson, E. Gutterman, C. Hemmings, A. Idler, D. Islas, J. Janssens, S. Jeperson, M. Joutsen, A. Kupatadze, R. Le Cour Grandmaison, S. Lemiere, A. Markovska, V. Mete, S. Musau, A. Orlova, I. Roberge, A. Rostami, D. Silverstone, M. Shaw, D. Smith Jr., F. Strazzari, M. Tzvetkova, C. van Ham, G. Walton, J. Wheatley, J. Whittle, Y. Zabyelina, G. Zanoletti

Organized Crime: From the Mob to Transnational Organized Crime, Seventh Edition, provides readers with a clear understanding of organized crime, including its definition and causes, how it is categorized under the law, models to explain its persistence, and the criminal justice response to organized crime, including investigation, prosecution, defense, and sentencing. This book offers a comprehensive survey, including an extensive history of the Mafia in the United States; a legal analysis of the offenses that underlie organized crimes; specific attention to modern manifestations of organized crime activity, such as human smuggling, Internet crimes, and other transnational criminal operations; and the application of ethics to the study of organized crime. A new section has been added on threat assessment in organized crime. Chapters are enhanced by updated photos, tables, charts, and critical thinking exercises that help students apply concepts to actual organized crime cases. Every chapter includes two student-friendly special features: Organized Crime Biography and Organized Crime at the Movies. A glossary gives students a quick reference for looking up important definitions of organized crime-related terms, and a Timeline of Organized Crime in the United States highlights important events in the history of organized crime.

An examination of the forces and events that led to the most successful organized crime control initiatives in American history Since Prohibition, the Mafia has captivated the media and, indeed, the American imagination. From Al Capone to John Gotti, organized crime bosses have achieved notoriety as anti- heroes in popular culture. In practice, organized crime grew strong and wealthy by supplying illicit goods and services and by obtaining control over labor unions and key industries. Despite, or perhaps because of, its power and high profile, Cosa Nostra faced little opposition from law enforcement. Yet, in the last 15 years, the very foundations of the mob have been shaken, its bosses imprisoned, its profits diminished, and its influence badly weakened. In this vivid and dramatic book, James B. Jacobs, Christopher Panarella, and Jay Worthington document the government's relentless attack on organized crime. The authors present an overview of the forces and events that led in the 1980s to the most successful organized crime control initiatives in American history. Enlisting trial testimony, secretly taped conversations, court documents, and depositions, they document five landmark cases, representing the most important organized crime prosecutions of the modern era-Teamsters Local 560, The Pizza Connection, The Commission, the International Teamsters, and the prosecution of John Gotti.

In Chicago in mid-twentieth century amid the haze and smoke of urban renewal and the sounds of the wrecking balls and bulldozers, there lived two men, both street-savvy, one Black, one Irish, one young, one old and both leaders of their clans. Each ruled with an iron fist. Each embodied the fighting spirit of the turbulent 1960s. One was David Barksdale, the Black Disciples leader, a Black youth club that would give birth to America's largest street gang; the other was Richard J. Daley, the legendary Mayor of the City of Chicago. He was one of the longest-serving, most prominent mayors in American history and the last of the big-city "bosses." Although the two never met, at least not face-to-face, their fates were linked by a time of change, an era of protest, which was a decisive moment of transformational power that was on the verge of a violent uprising in America's second-largest city. This is a book that is as lively as its subject. A braided narrative of two larger than life people, it has the boldness to combine two oddly related 1960s stories into a single narrative that is both intimate and epic. One captures the unlikely story of a Negro boy whose share-cropping family migrated from rural Mississippi to Chicago, where he started a street gang that became the largest in America. The book's other path follows America's last big city "boss," whose persona is legendary and bigger than life. While historians, political pundits, and those who knew him speak of "Hizzonor" as being a proud, Irish-Catholic who was the long-time godfather of the Chicago Democratic Party and Mayor who saved Chicago from becoming another Detroit or Cleveland, they also acknowledge that he was a fierce segregationist. He had a contentious relationship with civil rights leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Richard Daley also played a significant role in the history of the United States Democratic Party. Williams an internationally recognized gang expert and interventionist, eloquently tells the story of these men, their clans, and their on-going struggle for power, status, and legacy. However unheard of and unimaginable, some of the incidents may seem, this is not a work of fiction. Everything written comes from archival documents, official reports, focus groups, in-depth interviews, or first-hand accounts. The action takes place mostly in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood. Still, there are some occasions where the action takes place in Bronzeville, the Woodlawn community, on the West Side of the City and downtown.

Adopting a multi-disciplinary and comparative approach, this book focuses on the emerging and innovative aspects of attempts to target the accumulated assets of those engaged in criminal and terrorist activity, organized crime and corruption. It examines the 'follow-the-money' approach and explores the nature of criminal, civil and regulatory responses used to attack the financial assets of those engaged in financial crime in order to deter and disrupt future criminal activity as well as terrorism networks. With contributions from leading international academics and practitioners in the fields of law, economics, financial management, criminology, sociology and political science, the book explores law and practice in countries with significant problems and experiences, revealing new insights into these dilemmas. It also discusses the impact of the 'follow-the-money' approach on human rights while also assessing effectiveness. The book will appeal to academics and researchers of financial crime, organized crime and terrorism as well as practitioners in the police, prosecution, financial and taxation agencies, policy-makers and lawyers.

The machine-gun murders of seven men on the morning of February 14, 1929, by killers dressed as cops became the gangland crime of the century."" Or so the story went. Since then it has been featured in countless histories, biographies, movies, and television specials. 'The St. Valentine's Day Massacre, ' however, is the first book-length treatment of the subject, and it challenges the commonly held assumption that Al Capone ordered the slayings to gain supremacy in the Chicago underworld.""

2013 Outstanding Book Award Winner from the Division of International Criminology, American Society of Criminology Every year, thousands of Chinese women travel to Asia and the United States in order to engage in commercial sex work. In Selling Sex Overseas, Ko-lin Chin and James Finckenauer challenge the current sex trafficking paradigm that considers all sex workers as victims, or sexual slaves, and as unwilling participants in the world of commercial sex. Bringing to life an on-the-ground portrait of this usually hidden world, Chin and Finckenauer provide a detailed look at all of its participants: sex workers, pimps, agents, mommies, escort agency owners, brothel owners, and drivers. Ultimately, they probe the social, economic, and political organization of prostitution and sex trafficking, contradicting many of the 'moral crusaders' of the human trafficking world.

By analysing the complex issues surrounding internal and cross-border human trafficking in Asia, and asserting critical perspectives and methodologies, this book extends the range of sites for discussion and sectors in which human trafficking takes place.

The book re-centres human trafficking as an area of legitimate academic inquiry in a region that is often considered as an epicentre for human trafficking: East and Southeast Asia. It thus offers an in-depth analysis and up-to-date knowledge on research methodologies and engagements, patterns and forms of human trafficking, constructively critiquing anti-trafficking campaigns and discourses, and offering examples of good practice within the region that help us move beyond the impasse that currently hampers human trafficking as a field of inquiry in the social sciences.

Providing constructive avenues for human trafficking research to proceed methodologically, theoretically and ethically, this book is of interest to students and scholars of Politics, International Relations and Southeast Asian Studies.

In recent years, drug use, illegal migration and human trafficking have all become more common in Asia, North America and Asia: the problems of organized crime and human trafficking are no longer confined to operating at the traditional regional level. This book fills a gap in the current literature by examining transnational crime, human trafficking and its implications for human security from both Western and Asian perspectives. The book: Provides an outline of the overall picture of organized crime and human trafficking in the contemporary world, examining the current trends and recent developments contrasts the experience and perception of these problems in Asia with those in the West, by analyzing the distinctive Japanese perspective on globalization, human security and transnational crime examines the policy responses of key states and international institutions in Germany, Canada, the United States, the European Union, Japan, and Korea. This book argues that any effort to combat these crimes requires a response that addresses the welfare of human beings alongside the standard criminal law response. It represents a timely analysis of the increasingly serious problems of transnational crime, human trafficking and security.

Despite a resurgence in the number of studies of Chinese social control over the past decade or so, no sustained work in English has detailed the recent developments in policy and practice against serious crime, despite international recognition that Chinese policing of serious crime is relatively severe and that more people are executed for crime in China each year than in the rest of the world combined. In this book the author skilfully explores the politics, practice, procedures, and public perceptions of policing serious crime in China, focusing on one particular criminal justice practice - anti-crime campaigns - in the period of transition from planned to market economy from the 1980s to the first years of the twenty-first century. Susan Trevaskes analyzes the elements that led to the Hard Strike becoming the preferred method of attacking the growing problem of serious crime in China before going on to examine the factors surrounding the failure of the Hard Strike as a way of addressing the main problems of serious crime in China today, that is drug trafficking and organized crime . Drawing on a rich variety of Chinese sources Serious Crime in China is an original and informed read for scholars of China, criminologists generally and the international human rights community.

More than simply a study of the mafia, Alfredo Schulte-Bockholt's work argues that collaboration between political science and criminology is critical to understanding the real nature of organized crime and its power. Schulte-Bockholt looks at specific case studies from Asia, Latin America, and Europe as he develops a theoretical discussion - drawing on the thought of Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, and Antonio Gramsci - of the intimate connections between criminal groups and elite structures. Ranging from an historical discussion of the world drug economy to an examination of the evolution of organized crime in the former Soviet Union, the book extends into a consideration of the possible future development of organized crime in the age of advanced globalization.

This book, "Corruption and Racketeering In The New York City Construction Industry: The Final Report of the New York State Organized Task Force," lays out in close and compelling detail the intricate patterns of currupt activities and relationships that for the better part of a century have characterized business as usual in the construction industry in America's largest metropolis.

The book is the end product of more than five years' worth of investigation, prosecutions, and research by the New York State Organized Crime Task Force, a unique agency that has set a national example for marrying law enforcement initiatives with comprehensive and exhausting analysis of the causes and dynamics of industrial racketeering. This is a sobering analysis of the construction industry, one of New York City's largest industries, and in effect, one of the city's most significant economic sectors. In any given year during the 1980s, billions of dollars of construction were being carried out at any one time. The industry regularly employs more than 100,000 people in the city, involving some one hundred union locals and many hundreds of general and specialty contractors as well as a large number of architects, engineers, and materials suppliers. The book shows--in great and provocative detail--how organized extortion, bribery illegal cartels, and bid rigging characterize construction in the city. The basis for much of this crim is labor racketeering, controlled or orchestrated by organized crime. It reveals how this world of corruption affects not only the private sector but the city's vast public works program, and it spells out the ways in which both organized crime and official corruption each sustain the dynamics of ongoing criminality.

Wrong-doing on a massive scale is documented at length. But this book is more than a recitation of extensive and systematic criminality. The book recommends a number of plausible options for genuine reform. Necessarily these are profound and radical solutions, but everyone who reads this book will conclude that only profound and radical solutions could hope to solve such an entrenched and intractable crime problem.

This illuminating study explores crimes against, and involving, wildlife and the resultant social harms. The authors go well beyond basic conceptions of animal-related crime, such as illicit trade, for a deeper exploration of wildlife criminology, using a novel approach that combines philosophical, legal and criminological perspectives. They shed light on both legal and illegal harms, including blood sports, wildlife as food and abuse in zoos, and consider the potential connections with inter-human crimes. This is a unique treatment of wildlife as victims of crime and a consideration of their rights as sentient beings that sets new horizons for the concept of wildlife criminology.

In recent years, the south-western border of the United States has come under increasing pressure from the activities of Mexican narco-insurgents. These insurgents have developed rapidly from beginnings as nebulous gangs into networked cartels that have exposed the porosity of the border. These cartels declare no allegiance to any nation and are engaging in asymmetrical warfare against sovereign states throughout Mexico and in Central America. Within such states, de facto political control is shifting to the cartels in the 'areas of impunity' that have emerged. This book addresses these concerns and focuses on the criminal insurgencies being waged by the gangs and cartels. It is divided into sections on theory, Mexico, and the Americas and contains a number of introductory essays pertaining to this premier security threat to the United States and her allies in the region. Topics covered include criminal and spiritual insurgency, cartel weapons, corruption, feral cities, Los Zetas, politicized gangs, and threat analysis in Central America. This book will be a valuable resource to scholars in the fields of regional security, criminal justice and American Studies. It will be of great benefit to military and civil policymakers and practitioners in the areas of law enforcement and counternarcotics. This book was published as a special issue of Small Wars and Insurgencies.

Situational crime prevention is the art and science of reducing opportunities for crime. Despite accumulating evidence of its value in reducing many different kinds of crime - such as burglary, fraud, robbery, car theft, child sexual abuse and even terrorism - little has previously been published about its role in reducing organised crimes. This collection of case studies, by a distinguished international group of researchers, fills this gap by documenting the application of a situational prevention approach to a variety of organised crimes. These include sex trafficking, cigarette and drug smuggling, timber theft, mortgage fraud, corruption of private professionals and public officials, and subversion of tendering procedures for construction projects. By moving the focus away from the nature of criminal organisations to the analysis of the crimes committed by these organisations, the book opens up a fresh agenda for policy and research. Situational Prevention of Organised Crimes will be of interest to those tasked with tackling organised crime problems, as well as those interested in understanding the ways that organised crime problems have manifested themselves globally, and how law enforcement and other agencies might seek to tackle them in the future.

Graphic depictions of crime in Mexico abound in the global imagination, fueled not merely by media representations, but also by an abundant body of scholarship that reproduces grotesque, simplistic characterizations of Mexico's people, cities and towns as crime-ridden and almost inherently violent. These representations, however, often lack evidence and forgo important contextual analyses, not to mention fail to incorporate the perspectives of its actors in the research development process. This collection of essays shows how community-based research efforts to examine practices like kidnapping, migrant smuggling, human trafficking, sex work and citizen-led forensics in Mexico can effectively correct methodological and conceptual gaps present in Mexico's dominant organized crime narrative, while providing effective mechanisms to inform academic and policy debates. This easy-to-read volume provides a much-needed re-assessment of Mexico's organized crime rhetoric, and also outlines a pathway for those interested in developing critical empirical research on illicit and criminalized practices. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the journal Victims & Offenders.

Human trafficking, and the related problems of organised crime and prostitution, has become a serious problem for post-Soviet countries since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Human trafficking has a major impact on the countries of origin, the destination countries and the countries of transit, and is a concern for those studying population and migration, economics, politics, international relations and security studies. This book examines human trafficking from post-Soviet countries, exploring the full extent of the problem and discussing countermeasures, both local and at the global level, and considering the problem in all its aspects. It focuses in particular on the experiences of the Baltic Sea region, setting out the nature of organised crime and the full range of threats against society.

A vain man of good looks, small means, and no family links to the mob, Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano steadily worked his way up to acting boss of the Bonanno crime family, becoming its leader when official boss Joseph Massino went to the clink in 2003. But at a time when the Mob was crawling with secret operatives and informants caving to government pressure to flip, Basciano obeyed the code of La Cosa Nostra. "I got faith in one guy," he told a group of mobsters during a secretly taped meeting. That man was Joseph Massino, head of the Bonanno borgata. But for all his loyalty, Basciano was still a hot-headed, cold-blooded killer, which led to his arrest. Then, in a remarkable betrayal that shook the Five Families to their foundation, Massino secretly cooperated with the FBI--the first official boss""ever to roll over. As a result, Basciano faced the death penalty, but a federal jury, disturbed by the prosecution's use of criminal informants, reached a surprising verdict. Veteran crime author Anthony M. DeStefano tells the riveting story of the last true believer in the Mob's cult of brotherhood and how he was betrayed by the only man he ever trusted.

Peace operations are increasingly on the front line in the international community's fight against organized crime; this book explores how, in some cases, peace operations and organized crime are clear enemies, while in others, they may become tacit allies. The threat posed by organized crime to international and human security has become a matter of considerable strategic concern for national and international decision-makers, so it is somewhat surprising how little thought has been devoted to addressing the complex relationship between organized crime and peace operations. This volume addresses this gap, questioning the emerging orthodoxy that portrays organized crime as an external threat to the liberal peace championed by western and allied states and delivered through peace operations. Based upon a series of case studies it concludes that organized crime is both a potential enemy and a potential ally of peace operations, and it argues for the need to distinguish between strategies to contain organized crime and strategies to transform the political economies in which it flourishes. The editors argue for the development of intelligent, transnational, and transitional law enforcement that can make the most of organized crime as a potential ally for transforming political economies, while at the same time containing the threat it presents as an enemy to building effective and responsible states. The book will be of great interest to students of peacebuilding, peace and conflict studies, organised crime, Security Studies and IR in general.

Criminalized power structures (CPS) are illicit networks that profit from transactions in black markets and from criminalized state institutions while perpetuating a culture of impunity. These criminalized power structures are the predominant spoilers of peace settlements and stability operations. This volume focuses on the means available to practitioners to cope with the challenges posed by CPS along with recommendations for improving their efficacy and an enumeration of the conditions essential for their success. The means range from economic sanctions and border controls to the use of social media and criminal intelligence-led operations. Each step of this toolkit is detailed, explaining what each tool is, how it can be used, which type of CPS it is best suited to address, and what is necessary to ensure success of the peace operations. The effectiveness of the tool is also assessed and its use is illustrated through real life situations, such as international supply chain controls to prevent the looting of natural resources in Western Africa or the intervention of international judges and prosecutors in Kosovo. A companion volume, Criminalized Power Structures: The Overlooked Enemies of Peace, articulates a typology for assessing the threats of CPS illustrated by many case studies.