This book examines the role of religion and spirituality in desistance from crime and disengagement from gangs. Drawing upon in-depth interviews with male gang members and offenders as well as insights gathered from pastors, chaplains, coaches and personal mentors, the testimonials span three continents, focusing on the USA, Scotland, Denmark and Hong Kong. This volume offers unique empirical findings about the role that religion and spirituality can play in enabling some male gang members and offenders to transition into a new social sphere characterised by the presence of substitute forms of brotherhood and trust, and alternative forms of masculine status. The author presents critical insights into the potential relationship between religious and spiritual participation and the emergence of coping strategies to deal with the 'stigmata' that gang masculinity leaves behind. With its wide-ranging and multi-perspective approach, this book will be essential reading for students and scholars of gang culture, masculinity and spirituality, as well as policy makers and practitioners.

This book provides a critical discussion of the way in which religion influences: criminal and antisocial behaviour, punishment and the law, intergroup conflict and peace-making, and the rehabilitation of offenders. The authors argue that in order to understand how religion is related to each of these domains it is essential to recognise the evolutionary origins of religion as well as how genetic and cultural evolutionary processes have shaped its essential characteristics. Durrant and Poppelwell posit that the capacity of religion to bind individuals into socially cohesive 'moral communities' can help us to understand its complex relationship with cooperation, crime, punishment, inter-group conflict and forgiveness. An original and innovative study, this book will be of special interest to criminologists and other social scientists interested in the role of religion in crime, punishment, intergroup conflict and law.

This book draws on research into darknet cryptomarkets to examine themes of cybercrime, cybersecurity, illicit markets and drug use. Cybersecurity is increasingly seen as essential yet it is also a point of contention between citizens, states, non-governmental organisations and private corporations as each grapples with existing and developing technologies. The increased importance of privacy online has sparked concerns about the loss of confidentiality and autonomy in the face of state and corporate surveillance on one hand, and the creation of ungovernable spaces and the facilitation of terrorism and harassment on the other. These differences and disputes highlight the dual nature of the internet: allowing counter-publics to emerge and providing opportunities for state and corporate domination through control of the data infrastructure. The Darknet and Smarter Crime argues that, far from being a dangerous anarchist haven, the darknet and the technologies used within it could have benefits and significance for everyone online. This book engages with a number of debates about the internet and new communication technologies, including: surveillance and social control, anonymity and privacy, the uses and abuses of data encryption technologies and cyber-cultures and collective online identities

This book examines the changing police landscape over the past 25 years to establish how Police Leadership has evolved to meet this challenge. Through interviews with 35 Chief Police Officers in the UK, the author explores a range of policing issues such as crime investigation, terrorism, police governance, austerity issues, the role of the IPCC and public order provision. The book also highlights views on key topics such as armed policing, globalisation of crime and the structure of forces. Building on the seminal text Chief Constables: Bobbies, Bosses or Bureaucrats by Robert Reiner, which is this year celebrating its 25th anniversary, this book brings research on policing up to date with the modern world. An engaging and well-researched project, this book will be of great interest to scholars of criminal justice, policing and security studies.

This book introduces 'convenience' as the key concept to explain financial crime by white-collar criminals. Based on a number of fraud examination- reports from the United States and Norway, the book documents empirical evidence of convenience among white-collar criminals. It advances our understanding of white-collar crime by drawing attention to private investigation reports by fraud examiners and financial crime specialists, who are in the growing business of fraud investigations. Reports of investigations have never before been researched in terms of white-collar criminals nor crime convenience. Reports of investigations by auditing and law firms represent a valuable empirical basis - in addition to court documents and other sources of information about financial crime. A methodical and well-researched study, this book will be of particular interest to scholars of criminological theory and law - in addition to ethics courses in business schools.

At the turn of the twentieth century, thousands of Italian immigrants left their home country for the United States and, particularly, New York City. A small minority of the immigrants were members of a criminal syndicate that largely victimized fellow immigrants. The most common crime was a type of extortion known as "Black Hand." The methods of extortion were particularly violent, and included kidnapping, arson, and murder. The New York Police Department, unable to speak the language and unaware of the traditions of the immigrants, was virtually helpless in dealing with them. In 1904, Italian-American Lt. Detective Joseph Petrosino formed a group of Italian detectives to deal exclusively with the extortion crimes and the criminal underworld of Italian society in New York which had become known in the American press as "The Black Hand Society." This book tells the story of The Italian Squad from its inception, through Petrisnio's death, to the squad's expansion into Queens and Brooklyn.

This book develops the idea that the Cosa Nostra Sicilian mafia likes and, more than any other criminal organization, follows the patterns of capitalist transformation. The author presents analysis of the mafia under post-fordism capitalism, showing how they rely on increasingly more flexible networks for reasons of both cost and dodging police control, as well as changing their core businesses in relation to the risk that some activities, such as drug trafficking, are likely to incur. Combining sociology, criminology and labour sociology, the book provides an interpretation of Cosa Nostra which focuses on the connection between legal and illegal economies and politics, thus doing away with the idea that organized crime is always an external entity to society. An authoritative and original study, this book will be of particular interest to scholars of criminal justice, politics and economics.

This book critically examines the link between guns and violence. It weighs the value of guns for self-protection against the adverse effects of gun ownership and carrying. It also analyses the role of public opinion, the Second Amendment to the US Constitution, and the firearms industry and lobby in impeding efforts to prevent gun violence. Confronting Gun Violence in America explores solutions to the gun violence problem in America, a country where 90 people die from gunshot wounds every day. The wide-range of solutions assessed include: a national gun licensing system; universal background checks; a ban on military-style weapons; better regulatory oversight of the gun industry; the use of technologies, such as the personalization of weapons; child access prevention; repealing laws that encourage violence; changing violent norms; preventing retaliatory violence; and strategies to rebuild American communities. This accessible and incisive book will be of great interest to students and researchers in criminology and sociology, as well as practitioners and policy-makers with an interest in gun ownership and violence.

There are no villains here. Award-winning journalist Paul McNally finds corrupt cops, drug dealers, vigilante residents, addicts, torturers, murderers and cops partnered with drug dealers. But no villains.

Raymond is a shop owner on Ontdekkers Road, in Johannesburg, who takes a baseball bat to the dealers when they break his rules. He systematically records in his notebook the police officers who come – all day, every day – to collect their bribe money from the dealers, and is looking for someone to trust. Khaba is a middle-aged police officer who wants a quiet life but whose demons will not leave him in peace. He is trying to regain his trust in what he once regarded as an honourable profession. Wendy is a petite, ageing police reservist who can handle an R5 rifle with confidence, but not the sadness that accompanies her in her daily life – the loss of her police officer husband, brutally murdered by a drug lord, and the addiction that has her adult son in its grip. She is looking for respect and affirmation and for her own life to have meaning.

Through different paths, the lives of Raymond, Khaba and Wendy intersect on the street as their attention is focused on the current power couple – a drug dealer named Obi and Lerato, a police officer. Seemingly untouchable, Obi and Lerato terrorise Ontdekkers, and in the process upset the balance of this already lawless world.

This book presents primary research conducted in Italy, USA, Australia and the UK on countering strategies and institutional perceptions of Italian mafias and local organized crime groups. Through interviews and interpretation of original documents, this study firstly demonstrates the interaction between institutional understanding of the criminal threats and historical events that have shaped these perceptions. Secondly, it combines analysis of policies and criminal law provisions to identify how policing models which combat mafia and organised crime activities are organized and constructed in each country within a comparative perspective. After presenting the similarities between the four differing policing models, Sergi pushes the comparison further by identifying both conceptual and procedural convergences and divergences across both the four models and within international frameworks. By looking at topics as varied as mafia mobility, money laundering, drug networks and gang violence, this book ultimately seeks to reconsider the conceptualizations of both mafia and organized crime from a socio-behavioural and cultural perspective.

This important reference work examines trafficking from a geographic perspective and investigates the driving forces behind it and the powers that are trying to curtail the problem. The worldwide crime of trafficking involves countless people, animals and animal parts, and illicit goods such as drugs and weapons being moved and sold illegally. Often, the trafficking occurs with the local government or law enforcement's knowledge and complicity. This one-volume encyclopedia sheds light on a frightening and major issue, investigating the geography of trafficking and examining a range of examples of illegal human, animal, drug, and weapons movement around the world. After a preface and introduction that provides an exact definition of trafficking, the encyclopedia presents thematic essays that explore the various specific kinds of trafficking. Approximately 30 country profiles describe who and what is trafficked in each country, the motivations of those doing the trafficking, where people and things are being moved to, how the trafficking occurs, and what actions are being taken in an effort to prevent it. An appendix of primary documents, interesting sidebars, a bibliography, and a glossary listing key terms and important organizations round out the work. Provides a comprehensive look at the geography of trafficking as a whole that highlights how different kinds of trafficking are often related Supplies a much-needed reference book on a topic that is of perennial interest and often mentioned in media Includes an appendix of primary documents that includes excerpts from anti-trafficking acts and policies, declarations, human rights campaigns, and other important sources, each with an introduction

The perceived threat of 'transnational organised crime' to Western societies has been of huge interest to politicians, policy-makers and social scientists over the last decade. This book considers the origins of this crime, how it has been defined and measured, and the appropriateness of governments' policy responses. The contributors argue that while serious harm is often caused by transnational criminal activity - for example, the trafficking in human beings - the construction of that criminal activity as an external threat obscures the origins of these crimes in the markets for illicit goods and services within the 'threatened' societies. As such, the authors question the extent to which global crime can be controlled through law enforcement initiatives and alternative policy initiatives are considered. The authors also question whether transnational organised crime will retain its place on the policy agendas of the United Nations and European Union in the wake of the 'war on terror'.

This book provides practical recommendations on how to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of AML compliance by introducing the theory, framework and approach for dealing with the concerns of Money Laundering Reporting Officers (MLROs) within the UK banking industry. Accordingly, Bello focusses on providing a theoretical explanation of compliance behaviour which is inadequately covered. Although the research is centred on MLROs within the UK banking industry, the self-protecting theory discovered from the research has general application to other compliance officers within and outside the UK. It is also applicable to regulatory environments in other economic sectors. The choice of MLROs and the UK as the focus of the study was because these individuals are arguably the most important stakeholders in AML and the UK is one of the largest financial centres in the world that provides opportunity for money laundering activities. A methodological and detailed study, this book will be of particular interest to practitioners and the regulatory authorities, as well as scholars of criminology and finance.

This book responds to the claim that criminology is becoming socially and politically irrelevant despite its exponential expansion as an academic sub-discipline. It does so by addressing the question 'what is to be done' in relation to a number of major issues associated with crime and punishment. The original contributions to this volume are provided by leading international experts in a wide range of issues. They address imprisonment, drugs, gangs, cybercrime, prostitution, domestic violence, crime control, as well as white collar and corporate crime. Written in an accessible style, this collection aims to contribute to the development of a more public criminology and encourages students and researchers at all levels to engage in a form of criminology that is more socially relevant and more useful.

From corporate corruption and the facilitation of money laundering, to food fraud and labour exploitation, European citizens continue to be confronted by serious corporate and white-collar crimes. Presenting an original series of provocative essays, this book offers a European framing of white-collar crime. Experts from different countries foreground what is unique, innovative or different about white-collar and corporate crimes that are so strongly connected to Europe, including the tensions that exist within and between the nation-states of Europe, and within the institutions of the European region. This European voice provides an original contribution to discourses surrounding a form of crime which is underrepresented in current criminological literature.

Human trafficking has emerged as one of the top international and domestic policy concerns, and is well covered and often sensationalized by the media. The nature of the topic combined with various international pressures has resulted in an array of government-led mandates to combat the issue. The Domestication of Human Trafficking examines Canada's criminal justice approaches to human trafficking, with a particular focus on the ways in which the intersecting factors of race, class, gender, and sexuality impact practice. Using a wide range of qualitative and empirically grounded research methods, including extensive analysis of court documents, trial transcripts, and interviews with criminal justice actors, this book contributes to much-needed research that examines, specifies, and sometimes complicates the narratives of how trafficking works as a criminal offence. The Domestication of Human Trafficking turns our attention to the ways in which the offence of human trafficking is made on the front lines of criminal justice efforts in Canada.

Phases of Terrorism in the Age of Globalization considers terrorism as an aspect of the capitalist world system for almost five centuries. Jalata's research reveals that terrorism can emerge from above as state terrorism and below as subversive organizations or groups.

Human trafficking has emerged as one of the top international and domestic policy concerns, and is well covered and often sensationalized by the media. The nature of the topic combined with various international pressures has resulted in an array of government-led mandates to combat the issue. The Domestication of Human Trafficking examines Canada's criminal justice approaches to human trafficking, with a particular focus on the ways in which the intersecting factors of race, class, gender, and sexuality impact practice. Using a wide range of qualitative and empirically grounded research methods, including extensive analysis of court documents, trial transcripts, and interviews with criminal justice actors, this book contributes to much-needed research that examines, specifies, and sometimes complicates the narratives of how trafficking works as a criminal offence. The Domestication of Human Trafficking turns our attention to the ways in which the offence of human trafficking is made on the front lines of criminal justice efforts in Canada.

Hidden Power reveals criminal mafias determining political outcomes to suit their own agendas, and tells how they do it - by influencing elections, changing constitutions, fomenting terrorism, waging war, negotiating peace deals and working behind the scenes in pivotal historical moments such as the Second World War and the Cuban Missile Crisis.Drawing on unpublished government documents and mafia memoirs, James Cockayne reveals a century of forgotten political-criminal collaboration in New York, Sicily and the Caribbean and explains how such links persist globally, from the drug wars in Mexico, to smuggling routes in West Africa, to political instability in Russia, Ukraine and Central Asia.Forcing us to rethink our distinctions between politics, conflict and crime, Hidden Power reveals a world in which states and mafias compete - and collaborate - for power.

The true story of London's toughest, deadliest street gangs: the events, the rules and the real top boys. Are the streets of London some of the deadliest in the world? What's the truth behind the headlines? And who are the real top boys? Looking beyond the hit TV series, The Real Top Boys reveals the lives of the street gangs who have taken over, and now rule, dozens of corners of the UK's capital. Bestselling true crime author Wensley Clarkson takes us on a tour of the housing estates and volatile neighbourhoods where pride, rivalry and revenge are the codes people live and die by. He talks to the criminals who have helped create this chilling modern-day underworld and recounts the vicious turf wars that changed the map, unravels the rules and rights of the streets, and charts the rise and fall of many of the game's key players over the decades that have transformed the city. Featuring interviews with real-life gangsters and told in a gripping story that lays bare the hard life in this world, The Real Top Boys is the ultimate account of gang life in London and a jaw-dropping look at who really runs the streets.

The second volume of Sex Trafficking: International context and response Human trafficking and modern slavery have captured the imagination and attention of the international community. This book builds on the authors' first volume, Sex Trafficking: International context and response. Much has changed since the first volume was published, not least the shift away from sex trafficking to modern slavery as the dominant focus in policy and advocacy. Yet, as the authors argue, little has changed with regards to how nations respond. This volume re-examines the international counter-trafficking scholarship and policy response, to offer an analysis based on original and new data. This book lays the ground for specific forms of research and inquiry that are necessary to better understand and respond to the range of exploitative practices and conditions that give rise to human trafficking. This book offers a detailed analysis of the dominant response to human trafficking, which is framed by the criminal justice process. Examining the identification of victims, the investigation of cases, victim support, prosecutorial decisions and repatriation practices, the authors draw upon original research from Australia, Serbia and Thailand: three diverse nations that, like nations across the globe, have invested heavily in criminalisation as the dominant response to counter trafficking. They argue that exploitation sits at the nexus of global migration patterns and emphasise the importance of speaking to those directly affected by counter-trafficking policies and those directly involved in their implementation in order to produce empirical data to inform how we make sense of the numbers that are produced, the outcome of the policies and how we ought to determine success in this context. An empirical, criminologically informed opportunity to reconsider the dominant ways of understanding and strategies of responding to human trafficking, this multi-disciplinary book will be of interest to those engaged in criminology, sociology, law, political science, public policy and gender studies.

Graphic narratives of tragedies involving the journeys of irregular migrants trying to reach destinations in the global north are common in the media and are blamed almost invariably on human smuggling facilitators, described as rapacious members of highly structured underground transnational criminal organizations, who take advantage of migrants and prey upon their vulnerability. This book contributes to the current scholarship on migration by providing a window into the lives and experiences of those behind the facilitation of irregular border crossing journeys. Based on fieldwork conducted among coyotes in Arizona - the main point of entry for irregular migrants in the United States by the turn of the 21st Century - this project goes beyond traditional narratives of victimization and financial exploitation and asks: who are the men and women behind the journeys of irregular migrants worldwide? How and why do they enter the human smuggling market? How are they organized? How do they understand their roles in transnational migration? How do they explain the violence and victimization so many migrants face while in transit? This book is suitable for students and academics involved in the study of migration, border enforcement and migrant and refugee criminalization.

From supreme president to forgotten enemy, John W. Talbot lived a remarkable life. Charismatic, energetic, and powerful, he founded a national fraternal organization, the Order of Owls, and counted senators, congressmen, and business leaders among his friends. He wielded his influence to help causes close to his heart but also to bring down those who stood against him. In So Much Bad in the Best of Us, Greta Fisher's careful research reveals that Talbot was capable of great evil, causing one woman to describe him as "the Devil Incarnate." His string of very public affairs revealed his strange sexual preferences and violent tendencies, and charges leveled against him included perjury, blackmail, jury tampering, slander, libel, misuse of the mail, assault with intent to kill, and White slavery. Ultimately convicted on the slavery charge, he spent several years in Leavenworth penitentiary and eventually lost everything, including control of the Order of Owls. His descent into alcoholism and death by fire was a fitting end to a tumultuous and dramatic life. After 50 years of newspaper headlines and court battles, Talbot's death made national news, but with more enemies than friends and estranged from his family, he was ultimately forgotten. A gripping true crime story, So Much Bad in the Best of Us offers a mesmerizing account of the life of John W. Talbot, the Order of Owls, and how quickly the powerful can fall.

The ever increasing use of computers, networks and the Internet has led to the need for regulation in the fields of cybercrime, cybersecurity and national security. This SpringerBrief provides insights into the development of self- and co-regulatory approaches to cybercrime and cybersecurity in the multi-stakeholder environment. It highlights the differences concerning the ecosystem of stakeholders involved in each area and covers government supported initiatives to motivate industry to adopt self-regulation. Including a review of the drawbacks of existing forms of public-private collaboration, which can be attributed to a specific area (cybercrime, cybersecurity and national security), it provides some suggestions with regard to the way forward in self- and co-regulation in securing cyberspace.