Farmers,factories and funds: organised crime and illicit drugs cultivation within the British Vietnamese community

This article explores the growth of organised crime within the Vietnamese community with particular reference to the cultivation of cannabis, money laundering and the smuggling or trafficking of children. The article begins by exploring the history and diversity of the ‘Vietnamese community’ in the United Kingdom and the role of Vietnamese culture in shaping their criminal enterprises. It then draws on research involving two sets of qualitative data: one set is based on 45 interviews with law enforcement personnel based in Vietnam and the United Kingdom as well as with key stakeholders in the Vietnamese community; the other set is based on structured questionnaires issued to 34 Vietnamese residents in Britain, 24 of whom are here illegally. It examines the relationship between illegal immigration of Vietnamese citizens to Britain and the urban cultivation of cannabis, in what has become known as ‘cannabis factories’, and the laundering of the profits abroad to Vietnam. After exposing the logistics of Vietnamese illegal immigration into Britain, the article concludes that those involved in cannabis cultivation, money laundering and people smuggling are primarily motivated by profit rather than ‘lifestyle’ concerns, and operate within what theorists of organised crime refer to as the ‘mono-ethnic criminal network’.     

Measuring organised crime-related harms: exploring five policing methods

Many law enforcement agencies around the world have adopted risk assessment methodologies to analyse organised crime. These assessments, which are intended to provide law enforcement management with rigourous analysis to enable rational and objective decision-making processes, are an integral part of intelligence-led policing. Despite the prevalence of these assessments, as the assessments and their methodologies are often tightly restricted within the law enforcement community, it is often unclear how law enforcement defines, analyses and makes decisions about organised crime. While the use of risk assessment methodology in policing to analyse organised crime is generally under-evaluated, critics point to serious methodological weaknesses. Another less-explored aspect in the scholarly literature is how law enforcement conceptualises and measures the impact of “harm” from organised crime and uses this analysis to inform priority-setting processes. This article explores how law enforcement assesses organised crime-related harm by examining five policing methods—one each from Australia and the Netherlands and three from the United Kingdom. The article finds that the methods have significant shortcomings: the main concepts are generally ill-defined and the operationalisation of these concepts is problematic. More importantly, the problems evident in the harm methods raise several critical questions, specifically whether measuring organised crime-related harms is empirically feasible and, if so, can be undertaken in a manner that meaningfully informs law enforcement’s decision-making and limits undue political interference.     

Women Who Participate in Illegal Pyramid Selling: Voices from Female Rural Migrant Offenders in China

Asian Journal of Criminology - Mainly through a case study, this article examines Chinese women’s involvement in one form of organised crime—illegal pyramid selling—which is...     

Illicit pharmaceutical networks in Europe: organising the illicit medicine market in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands

It has been widely suggested that the global market in counterfeit, falsified and illegally traded medicines has expanded at a tremendous rate in recent years, offering lucrative opportunities for criminal entrepreneurs with little legal risk. However, with a few exceptions, there has been little criminological research conducted on the trade’s actors and organisation. Of the few studies that are available, most position the supply of these products in the context of ‘transnational organised crime’, often presupposing the overwhelming presence of large-scale, hierarchical structures in the trade. This article, based on two extensive research projects in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, offers an account of the illicit supply of medicines in two European jurisdictions. The research outlines the nature and dynamics of the trade including the roles played by each national context as nodes in the global supply chain. The focus then shifts to the modus operandi, actors, online trade and social organisation in both countries. In contradistinction to the ‘transnational organised crime’ narrative, the empirical data outlined in this paper demonstrates that actors and networks involved in the trade are highly flexible and complex structures that straddle the categories of licit and illicit, online and offline, and global and local. This suggests that operations supplying illicit medicines vary largely in terms of size, reach, organisation and legality.     

An introduction to the special issue on ‘Organised crime and illegal markets in the UK and Ireland’

This paper provides an introduction to the articles and report excerpt submitted to the special issue of Trends in Organized Crime on ‘Organised crime and illegal markets in the UK and Ireland’. The aim of the special issue is to draw together empirical research findings and theoretical accounts on various manifestations of organised crime in the particular geographic context(s), the evolution of organised crime, the links between organised crime, the legal sphere and paramilitary groups, as well as an account of the demographic profile and attitudes of citizens in areas in which organised crime groups thrive.     

Italian Organised Crime: Mafia Associations and Criminal Enterprises

The article reviews the different forms of organised crime in Italy. To begin with, it focuses on the Sicilian Cosa Nostra and the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta, Italy's two largest and most powerful mafia associations. With their centuries-old histories, articulated structures, sophisticated ritual and symbolic apparatuses and claim to exercise a political dominion, these associations have few parallels in the world of organised crime. In its second section, the article considers other groups and networks that are--with varying degrees of justification--also routinely described as organised crime: these range from the Neapolitan camorra to Apulian organised crime and the so-called new 'foreign mafie' and other criminal entrepreneurs. Whereas the new Italian and foreign players are likely to expand their activities on Italy's illegal markets, the future of Cosa Nostra and the 'Ndrangheta is more uncertain and largely depends on the decisions made by the public administrations.     

Smuggling and Trafficking in Human Beings: The Phenomenon, The Markets that Drive It and the Organisations that Promote It

This article will define the concepts of smuggling and trafficking in human beings and discuss the difficulty in applying the definition. The magnitude and scope of the problem will be examined as well as its causes. Trafficking in human beings will be analysed as an illegal market, particularly with reference to its relationship with other illegal markets and the involvement of organised crime groups. The phenomenon will be discussed in more depth focusing on countries and regions where projects are currently being implemented under the auspices of the United Nations Global Programme against Trafficking in Human Beings. The discussion closes with an overview of situations which facilitate the practice, and current measures and recommendations to stem the tide of smuggling and trafficking.     

Changing Typology of Organised Crime in a Post-Socialist Lithuania (the Late 1980s–Early 2000s)

This paper analyzes the dynamics of organised crime in post-socialist Lithuania. Three overlapping periods in evolution of organised crime are discerned. During the mid 1980s organised crime emerged with the attempts to liberalise the state socialism by legalizing cooperative and individual property as a basis for economic activities. By the early 1990s organised crime in Lithuania began to metamorphose from illegal manufacturing to opportunistic criminality associated with the privatisation of state property. Since the mid 1990s organised crime has again undergone change. It has entered what could be termed a maturation phase. This maturation was influenced by a number of factors including; the end of the privatization process, resumed growth of the economy, development of the legal and fiscal infrastructure to regulate a market economy, and increasing effectiveness and successes of policing in Lithuania [1] [1] Johnstone, Peter 2005. ‘Commissar-General Vytautas Grigaravièius, Lithuania national police’. Police Practice and Research, 5(4–5), September–December, pp. 357–370. . In this article the political, socio-economic, organisational and cultural factors that influenced the dynamics of change in organised crime are analyzed.     

Border Enforcement,Organized Crime,and Deaths of Smuggled Migrants on the United States – Mexico Border

In response to ever increasing numbers of illegal immigrants entering the United States from Mexico, the United States adopted a border enforcement strategy in the 1990s that sought to bring the problem under control. This strategy relied primarily on increasing the number of Border Patrol agents directly on the border, the erection of walls at heavy traffic areas, and insertion of electronic surveillance systems. While these efforts succeeded in making it more difficult for illegal migrants to gain entry into the United States undetected, it also resulted in an increased reliance on human smugglers. Thus, the nature of the problem has shifted from one of illegal immigration to one of human smuggling. In an effort to gain entry successfully, smugglers have continued to lead migrants through hazardous terrain along the border where surveillance is less intense. Anecdotal evidence is presented which suggests that smugglers' drive for profit often results in the abandonment and death of migrants. Implications for future border policing strategy and research are discussed. An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the International Conference on Organized Crime and Humanitarian Disasters at the initiative of the International Scientific and Professional Advisory Council of the United Nations Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Programme (ISPAC) in cooperation with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Courmayeur Mont Blanc, Italy, December 3–5, 2004.     

Serious white collar fraud: historical and contemporary perspectives

This article traces the development of fraud throughout history and the establishment of a class of criminal activity committed by members of the business community. There have been a number of attempts to legislate against white collar crime as a specific offence and these efforts have thrown up many definitional problems. The historical development of crimes committed by the business community is investigated within the context of the different approaches formulated in England & Wales and France, this leads into discussion of the possibility that in future there may be a fusion of organised crime and white collar crime in a global context. Many commentators and government agencies believe there is an expansion of the network of organised crime into the business environment and there is a danger that in attempting to overcome legal and socio-legal terminology active deterrence and prosecution is delayed. The issue of competing themes and meanings are explored and the conclusion identifies the controversies that continue to surround this subject and proposes a definition of white collar crime for international application. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Organised crime threat assessments: a critical review

Since the beginning of the 21st century, several national and international government agencies have initiated organised crime threat assessments. Additionally, a few scholars have published methods to assess the risks and threats of organised crime. These governmental bodies and scholars claim that their reports and methods can demonstrate that certain forms of organised crime are more threatening than others and thus help policy-makers set strategic priorities. In this article I discuss these claims by examining the reliability and validity of the operational definitions of the key concepts used, such as organised crime, threat and risk. This examination reveals that most reports and methods provide insufficient detail—and sometimes even no details at all—to guarantee the reliability and validity of their operational definitions. The search for validity is made particularly difficult by the ambiguity surrounding the concepts of organised crime, threat and risk, while the concept of cost is less problematic. Moreover, establishing what constitutes a threat is at its core a normative decision that cannot be left to intelligence analysts or scientists alone. The challenge ahead lies in acknowledging the normative framework of organised crime threat assessments and within that framework maximising the reliability and validity of the operational definitions of key concepts and related measuring instruments.     

North American Organised Crime

The Italian-American mafia is one of the most enduring images of organised crime, but separating fictional images of organised crime from the real thing has not been easy. Overall, organised crime is a continuing criminal enterprise that rationally works to profit from illicit activities that are often in great public demand. Its continuing existence is maintained through the use of force, threats, monopoly control, and/or the corruption of public officials. The past 20 years have seen a decline in the influence of Italian-American organised crime in the US, but this has been offset by the rise of other forms of organised crime, not least groups from the former USSR. Meanwhile, the Canadian underworld is dominated by Asian groups, East European groups, Italian groups, and outlaw motorcycle gangs. The major organised crime groups in Mexico are extended networks composed of Mexican nationals living in Mexico, Mexican-Americans, and Mexican immigrants living in the United States, operating as competing networks in the illicit drug business from supply, to transit, to destination and buyers.     

Out of the woods: the illegal trade in tropical timber and a European trade hub

This article responds to the call for more empirical knowledge about transnational environmental crime by analysing the illegal trade in tropical timber. It aims to provide insights into the social organisation of the illegal transports of tropical timber within the local research setting of the port of Antwerp (Belgium) but meanwhile pays attention to elements throughout the flows from locations of origin over transit to destination. It is often difficult to determine which legal and illegal actors are involved in transnational environmental crime. This research sheds light on the legal–illegal interfaces in tropical timber flows connected to this European setting. The results show that the social organisation of transnational environmental crime is shaped by the global context of the places of origin, transit and destination, where it is continuously on a thin line between legal and illegal.     

“Shifting the stuff wasn’t any bother”: Illicit enterprise, tobacco bootlegging and deconstructing the British government’s cigarette smuggling discourse

This paper presents the results of interactions/interviews with an active tobacco bootlegger regarding his illicit entrepreneurial activity spanning his illegal career. This narrative is intended to portray a snapshot of a type of organised criminality within an illicit market place but seeks to add to the critical academic literature responding to State-led depictions of organised crime as an apocalyptic menace. The results of the fieldwork suggest that illicit market enterprise in this context is neither threatening nor predatory, is very ordinary and, crucially, is driven by insatiable consumer demand within local trading networks.     

Strategic versus emergent crime groups: the case of Vietnamese cannabis cultivation in the Netherlands

This article addresses the nature and development of the Vietnamese involvement in cannabis cultivation in the Netherlands. The findings are based on empirical data collected from national police registrations, case studies and in-depth interviews with over 30 Dutch and international respondents. The authors describe the background characteristics of Vietnamese cannabis farmers, the structure of the predominantly mono-ethnic Vietnamese criminal groups and the international context. A situational approach to organised crime is applied to illustrate the ‘emergent’ character of the Vietnamese crime groups as opposed to a ‘strategic’ context of organised crime. The Vietnamese supervisors in the Netherlands have legal citizenship and often have ‘careers’ in cannabis-related crimes. It would appear that for a Vietnamese gardener or farmer, the path into cannabis cultivation is linked to financial debt. Besides situational factors, group characteristics, such as the migrant community, seem important in understanding the Vietnamese involvement in the Dutch cannabis market.     

‘Endemic to the species’: ordering the ‘other’ via organised crime

The United States has been the prime mover in the establishment of both the concept of organised crime and the use of the concept in its attempt to establish global hegemony, in which law enforcement became a little more than a front for a government-backed central casting agency, stereotyping both heroes and villains. This article offers an account of how the ‘Other’ has been used as prism for the construction of organised crime primarily in the United States and how this construction, as a franchise, has been exported on the international level and on heterogeneous criminal landscapes.     

‘No banquet can do without liquor’: alcohol counterfeiting in the People’s Republic of China

The illegal trade in alcohol has been an empirical manifestation of organised crime with a very long history; yet, the nature of the illegal trade in alcohol has received relatively limited academic attention in recent years despite the fact that it has been linked with significant tax evasion as well as serious health problems and even deaths. The current article focuses on a specific type associated with the illegal trade in alcohol, the counterfeiting of alcohol in China. The article pays particular attention to the counterfeiting of baijiu - Chinese liquor - in mainland China. The aim of the article is to offer an account of the social organisation of the alcohol counterfeiting business in China by illustrating the counterfeiting process, the actors in the business as well as its possible embeddedness in legal practices, trades and industries. The alcohol counterfeiting business is highly reflective to the market demand and consumer needs. Alcohol counterfeiting in China is characterised primarily by independent actors many of whom are subcontracted to provide commodities and services about the counterfeiting process. The business relies on personal networks – family and extended family members, friends and acquaintances. Relationships between actors in the business are very often based on a customer-supplier relationship or a ‘business-to-business market’. The alcohol counterfeiting business in China highlights the symbiotic relationship between illegal and legal businesses.     

Organized crime, corruption and power

The perception of organised crime as an external threat to political stability and integrity, as well as to orthodox commercial activity, is based on an assumption about the motives and intentions of organised criminals. It invariably results in a call for a war against crime. The reality and the possible solutions are less dramatic but also more complex. Organised criminals are concerned with both legal and illegal businesses where bribery of public officials and involvement with orthodox commercial activity are part of that business. While organised criminals may want to enjoy the profits of their business rather than subvert societies what they do and how they do it can have adverse consequences for societies and should be addressed. In seeking to do this, however, it is necessary not only to analyse threats to target resources more effectively but also discourage those public figures and orthodox businesses whose enthusiasm for short-term benefit overrides their moral judgement and thus allows organised crime to be tolerated within the societies to which they are supposed to be an external threat.