"It'd be easy for me to go back to my old life, but I know where that old life leads you. You're either behind prison bars or six feet underground." Terroll Lewis has lived a crazy life. Growing up on Brixton's Myatt's Field estate, he was surrounded by gang culture, and like so many other young people, he found it hard to resist the lifestyle. By the time he was 15, he had already joined a gang, been stabbed, shot at, and was selling drugs. A chance to play professional football offered a way out, but the lure of an easier life - the promise of girls, money, and cars - led him back to South London and the notorious OC, or Organised Crime, gang. Violence and drug dealing were the norm in OC, but Terroll has long since turned his back on this world, though the association with OC endures through the ink on his skin. These days Terroll's giving something back; Block Workout, a street-gym he founded in his old neighbourhood, gives young men an opportunity to follow a different road to the one he took during his adolescence - helping them develop their minds as well as their bodies - and the chance to live a better life.

'People didn't talk about the team, they talked about the mob that came with them' Terrifyingly vicious, brilliantly organised, tremendously feared and highly fashionable, the InterCity Firm were the most notorious football hooligan gang the country had ever seen. Bestselling author Cass Pennant was one of the I.C.F.'s best-known figures and has used his unique position as a West Ham insider to bring together these first-hand accounts of the men who were at the eye of storm, both on and off the terraces. In this classic account of football hooliganism at its terrifying height, all the faces of the West Ham firm reveal their memories and thoughts about the violence, the battles, the campaigns, the run-ins with the authorities, and all that came with it. Congratulations, you are just about to meet the I.C.F...

The Mexican drug trade has inspired prejudiced narratives of a war between north and south, white and brown; between noble cops and vicious kingpins, corrupt politicians and powerful cartels. In this first comprehensive history of the trade, historian Benjamin T. Smith tells the real story of how and why this one-peaceful industry turned violent. He uncovers its origins and explains how this illicit business essentially built modern Mexico, affecting everything from agriculture to medicine to economics—and the country’s all-important relationship with the United States. Drawing on unprecedented archival research; leaked DEA, Mexican law enforcement, and cartel documents; and dozens of harrowing interviews, Smith tells a thrilling story brimming with vivid characters—from Ignacia “La Nacha” Jasso, “queen pin” of Ciudad Juárez, to Dr. Leopoldo Salazar Viniegra, the crusading physician who argued that marijuana was harmless and tried to decriminalize morphine, to Harry Anslinger, the Machiavellian founder of the American Federal Bureau of Narcotics, who drummed up racist drug panics to increase his budget. Smith also profiles everyday agricultural workers, whose stories reveal both the economic benefits and the human cost of the trade. The Dope contains many surprising conclusions about drug use and the failure of drug enforcement, all backed by new research and data. Smith explains the complicated dynamics that drive the current drug war violence, probes the U.S.-backed policies that have inflamed the carnage, and explores corruption on both sides of the border. A dark morality tale about the American hunger for intoxication and the necessities of human survival, The Dope is essential for understanding the violence in the drug war and how decades-old myths shape Mexico in the American imagination today.

FROM THE AUTHOR OF ALL THE HIDDEN TRUTHS, WHICH WON THE MCILVANNEY DEBUT PRIZE '(a) meticulous and compelling novel about the aftermath of a major crime and its effect on the affected families and investigating officers both. Set in Edinburgh, too' - Ian Rankin 'Askew asks intricate moral questions, while never ignoring the rigours of crime' - Daily Mail DI Helen Birch faces a terrible choice - family or justice? - in the gripping second novel from the author of All the Hidden Truths DI Birch joined the police to find her little brother, who walked out of his life one day and was never seen again. She stayed to help others, determined to seek justice where she could. On the fourteenth anniversary of Charlie's disappearance, Birch takes part in a raid on one of Scotland's most feared criminal organisations. It's a good day's work - a chance to get a dangerous man off the streets. Two days later, Charlie comes back. It's not a coincidence. When Birch finds out exactly what he's been doing all those years, she faces a terrible choice: save the case, or save her brother. But how can you do the right thing when all the consequences are bad? As she interrogates Charlie, he tells his story: of how one wrong turn leads to a world in which the normal rules no longer apply, and you do what you must to survive. From one of the most acclaimed new voices in crime fiction, What You Pay For is a brilliantly tense and moving novel about the terrible disruption caused by violence and the lines people will cross to protect those they love.

PARALLEL LINES is the story of a deadly rivalry on both sides of the law. With criminal rival and would be underworld kingpin Declan Meehan on the verge of controlling Glasgow's lucrative illegal drug trade, Detective Sergeant Angus Thoroughgood vows to bring him down. An edgy and fast-paced crime thriller set in the seedy criminal underworld of Glasgow, Scotland, Parallel Lines is the first book in the long-running Thoroughgood series. With Meechan bludgeoning his competition into submission, seizing the city piece by piece, his conflict with Thoroughgood gets all too personal when Celine Lynott, the woman who broke Angus' heart ten-years earlier, falls for his nemesis. Parallel Lines sees author RJ Mitchell drawing from his 12 years of experience as a Glasgow police officer to drag readers into the city's sleazy underbelly to encounter the violent and lawless stories that can be found there.

This book critically examines the security-development nexus through an analysis of organised crime responses in post-conflict states. As the trend has evolved, the security-development nexus has received significant attention from policymakers as a new means to address security threats. Integrating the traditionally separate areas of security and development, the nexus has been promoted as a new strategy to achieve a comprehensive, people-centred approach. Despite the enthusiasm behind the security-development nexus, it has received significant criticism. This book investigates four tensions that influence the integration of security and development to understand why it has failed to live up to expectations. The book compares two case studies of internationally driven initiatives to address organised crime as part of post-conflict reconstruction in Sierra Leone and Bosnia. Examination of the tensions reveals that actors addressing organised crime have attempted to move away from a security approach, resulting in incipient integration between security and development, but barriers remain. Rather than discarding the nexus, this book explores its unfulfilled potential. This book will be of much interest to students of war and conflict studies, development studies, criminology, security studies and IR in general.

This book provides a novel criminological understanding of white-collar crime and corporate lawbreaking in China focusing on: lack of reliable official data, guanxi and corruption, state-owned enterprises, media censorship, enforcement and regulatory capacity. The text begins with an introduction to the topic placing it in global perspective, followed by chapters examining the importance of comparative study, corruption as a major crime in China, case studies and etiology, domestic, regional and global consequences, and concluding theoretical and policy issues that can inform future research.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the South Bronx had one of the highest per capita murder rates in America. As the use of crack cocaine surged, replacing heroin as the high of choice, dealers and gangs staked claims to territory and consumers through intimidation and murder, and families found themselves fractured by crime and incarceration. Chronicling the rise and fall of Sex Money Murder, one of the most violent gangs of its era, in this engrossing work of gritty urban reportage, Jonathan Green offers a visceral and devastating portrait of a New York City borough going down in flames, and of the detectives and prosecutors struggling to stem the tide of violence. Drawing on first-person interviews, police reports and court transcripts, Sex Money Murder, gives an extraordinary perspective on modern-day America.

'What a fantastic read, but not for the faint-hearted!' MARTINA COLE 'True crime has never been more female - or more deadly.' KIMBERLEY CHAMBERS 'Admired and respected by the men who worked with her, she is the real deal.' FREDDIE FOREMAN If you think you know everything about the East End's toughest gangsters, think again. Meet Linda Calvey, aka the Black Widow. Growing up after the war in the East End of London, Linda falls in with local gangsters including the Krays, Freddie Foreman and Ronnie Cook. When the love of her life, Mickey Calvey, is gunned down on a job gone wrong, Linda resolves to carry on his work. But in 1990, after years of living in fear of her lover Ronnie Cook, Linda finds herself accused of his murder alongside Danny Reece, in a trial that shocks the nation. Still, Linda sticks to her code of honour, refusing to confess. Until now... After 18 years behind bars alongside notorious names including Rose West and Myra Hindley, she is released. This is the final truth about her life and what happened the day Ronnie Cook was murdered.

2016 Outstanding Publication Award (The International Association for the Study of Organized Crime) Organized Crime: Analyzing Illegal Activities, Criminal Structures, and Extra-legal Governance provides a systematic overview of the processes and structures commonly labeled "organized crime," drawing on the pertinent empirical and theoretical literature primarily from North America, Europe, and Australia. The main emphasis is placed on a comprehensive classificatory scheme that highlights underlying patterns and dynamics, rather than particular historical manifestations of organized crime. Esteemed author Klaus von Lampe strategically breaks the book down into three key dimensions: (1) illegal activities, (2) patterns of interpersonal relations that are directly or indirectly supporting these illegal activities, and (3) overarching illegal power structures that regulate and control these illegal activities and also extend their influence into the legal spheres of society. Within this framework, numerous case studies and topical issues from a variety of countries illustrate meaningful application of the conceptual and theoretical discussion.

Human trafficking is consistently featured on the global political agenda. This book examines the trafficking of adult female victims for sexual exploitation, and specifically the understanding of consent and its influence in the identification and treatment of trafficking victims. Jessica Elliott argues that when applied to situations of human trafficking, migration and sexual exploitation, the notion of consent presents problems which current international laws are unable to address. Establishing the presence of 'coercion' and a lack of consent can be highly problematic, particularly in situations of human trafficking and exploitative prostitution; activities which may be deemed inherently coercive and problematically clandestine. By examining legal definitions of human trafficking in international instruments and their domestic implementation in different countries, the book explores victimhood in the context of exploitative migration, and argues that no clear line can be drawn between those who have been smuggled, trafficked, or 'consensually trafficked' into a situation of exploitation. The book will be great use and interest to students and researchers of migration law, transnational criminal law, and gender studies.

The first close-up look at the hidden world of Somali pirates by a young journalist who dared to make his way into their remote havens and spent a year infiltrating their lives.
For centuries, stories of pirates have captured imaginations around the world. The recent ragtag bands of pirates off the coast of Somalia, hijacking multimillion-dollar tankers owned by international shipping conglomerates, have brought the scourge of piracy into the modern era. Jay Bahadur's riveting narrative expose--the first of its kind--looks at who these men are, how they live, the forces that created piracy in Somalia, how the pirates spend the ransom money, how they deal with their hostages, among much, much more. It is a revelation of a dangerous world at the epicenter of political and natural disaster.

In March 1972, four young black men were arrested by a specialist pickpocket squad at Oval Underground Station and charged with theft and assault of police officers. Sentenced to two years in prison, the case seemed straightforward and credible to the judge and jury who convicted them - but these young men were completely innocent, victims of endemic police corruption. The real criminal in this case was the notorious DS Derek Ridgewell, later proven to be heavily involved in organised crime. Graham Satchwell, at one time Britain's most senior railway detective, has worked with Oval Four victim Winston Trew to reveal the rotten culture that not only enabled Ridgewell to operate as he did, but also to subsequently organise major thefts of property worth in excess of GBP1 million. Winston Trew's case was finally overturned in December 2019, but the far-reaching ramifications of Ridgewell's shocking activities has irreparably damaged many lives and must never be forgotten.

Trying to Make It is R. V. Gundur's journey from the US-Mexico border to America's heartland, from America's prisons to its streets, in search of the true story of the drug trade and the people who participate in it. The book begins in the Paso del Norte area, encompassing the sister cities of Ciudad Juarez and El Paso, which has been in the public eye as calls for securing the border persist. From there, it moves on to Phoenix, which was infamously associated with the drug trade through a series of kidnappings. Finally, the book goes on to Chicago, which has been a lightning rod of criticism for its gangs and violence. Gundur highlights the similarities and differences that exist in the American drug trade within the three sites and how they relate to current drug trade narratives in the US. At each stop, the reader is transported to the city's historical and contemporary contexts of the drug trade and introduced to the individuals who have lived them. Drug retailers, street and prison gang members, wholesalers, and the law enforcement personnel who try to stop them offer readers a comprehensive look at how various illicit enterprises work together to supply the drugs that American users demand. Most importantly, through a combination of macro- and microlevel vantage points, and comparative analysis of three key sites in illicit drug operations, the stories in Trying to Make It remind us that the people involved in the drug trade, for the most part, do not deserve vilification. Far from being a seemingly uniform, widespread threat or an unlimited array of bogeymen and women, they are ordinary people, living ordinary lives, just trying to make it.