Criminal Gangs Research Articles

The Mobility of Terror

The Nigerian state has witnessed an upsurge in violent crime – such as kidnapping, looting and cattle rustling – especially in its northwest geopolitical zone. Referred to as ‘armed bandits’ in local parlance, loosely organised criminal gangs with strong links to Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province have compounded the war on terror in the Sahel. In this article, Promise Frank Ejiofor draws on the New Mobilities Paradigm to contend that mobility is central to comprehending the persistence of armed banditry. By understanding the problem in this way, anti-terror legislation could then aim at effectively governing not just territorial spaces but also mobilities.◼

Proposing and Verifying Different Lines of Inquiry in the Investigation of Deliberate Destruction or Damage of Property

The authors summarize their research and present a system of general and special lines of inquiry put forward at the initial and subsequent stages of investigating deliberate destruction or damage of property, as well as typical portraits of the alleged offender as the basis for proposing these lines of inquiry. The investigation of the crime under Art. 167 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation is closely connected with the process of proposing and verifying general and special lines of inquiry. These general and special lines of inquiry into the deliberate destruction or damage of property are proposed on the basis of theoretical knowledge and factual data. Research of criminal cases allowed the authors to typify the personalities of alleged offenders in the crimes under consideration. The portrait of the typical offender acts as a theoretical basis for proposing theories regarding the personality of the alleged criminal (avenger, jealous person, envious person, repeat offender, arsonist, hooligan, bomber, member of a criminal gang, hypeman).

Legal Challenges to Cryptocurrency and its Guardian-Less Victims in India: A Critical Victimological Analysis

AbstractThe COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown pushed several groups of traders to rely on cryptocurrency as one of the chosen tools for commercial transactions. India is no exception. Because of its notorious misuses by criminal gangs, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) declared cryptocurrency as derecognized. Consequently, the Indian parliament also created a draft bill titled Banning of Cryptocurrency & Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill, 2019 (the Bill), which not only derecognizes the currency or the use of it for any commercial purposes, it also makes the investors, exchanges and agencies dealing with cryptocurrency criminally liable. Later, the Supreme Court of India in 2020 set aside the above-mentioned RBI guidelines banning cryptocurrency. But this has not nullified or suggested any amendment for the Bill. This article argues that due to this legal confusion, cryptocurrency investors, traders, exchanges and agencies, etc. have become guardian-less victims who may not be eligible to claim basic rights of victims as has been established by the United Nations Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power. In such a legal tangle, it is necessary to analyse the issues from cyber-victimological perspectives for providing functional suggestions for restitution of justice.

Mathematical Modeling of the Population Dynamics of Age-Structured Criminal Gangs with Correctional Intervention Measures

The prevalence of criminal gang activities in the society has continued to be a huge burden to mankind. Despite several attempts by the government and non-governmental organizations in curtailing the activities of criminal gangs, new criminal gangs are beginning to emerge with associated criminal cases on the high side, thereby causing social unrest. This paper examines the impact of correctional intervention measures on the population dynamics of the criminal gangs in Nigeria, following an age-structured paradigm. The existence of backward bifurcation is presented sequel to the coexistence of gang free equilibrium and gang endemic equilibrium when the reproduction number is less than unity. Also, the model exhibits periodic trajectories (Hopf bifurcation) as a result of coexistence among the criminal gang classes. Using the Nigeria crime data (from 1993 to 2013) as obtained from Elsevier Data in Brief, we analyze the criminal gang model quantitatively and provide the sociological implications of the results. The numerical results obtained from this work show that if at least 60% of adolescents between 8–17 years who commit crimes are apprehended with prompt prosecution and correction, we can potentially eradicate adolescent delinquencies from the population and thus control the entire criminal gangs’ population.

Women and Crime: Exploring the Role of Gender, Sexuality, and Race in Constructions of Female Criminality

This roundtable on women and crime was inspired by a discussion at a CUNY Dissections Seminar in April 2021, where Gülhan Balsoy presented her work in progress on Ottoman crime fiction in the early 20th century. The focus of her paper was a popular murder mystery series called The National Collection of Murders, which had been published in Istanbul in 1914. The protagonists of this fictional crime series were a mother and daughter known as the Dark Witch and the Bloody Fairy, who led an underground criminal gang living in a secret subterranean world beneath the city of Istanbul. While reading her paper the night before the seminar, I could not help but notice striking parallels between this fictional Ottoman murder mystery and the sensationalized media coverage of a 1921 Egyptian serial murder case, popularly known by the name of its alleged perpetrators, Raya and Sakina. In both the fictive Ottoman story and the Egyptian media coverage of a real crime, two sets of female relatives were presented as the respective leaders of a criminal gang that stole luxury goods from respectable families and turned their homes into human slaughterhouses. In both cases, the female gang leaders used “superstition” to deceive and trap their victims while continually outwitting the police, all against a backdrop of illicit sex.

Investigation and edification in a criminal case of corroboration in the production of drugs

False preparations are not produced in laboratories but especially in the form of „DIY” under far not sterile conditions. Pills, produced in generally in sheds, will be coated in concrete mixers and dried laid on the floor. The agents will be replaced by useless and for human consumption unsuitable materials. By inspection of false preparations were already found chalk powder, drugs, and in coloured products, brick-dust used as filling material. It is a well-known fact, that the most drugs, suspicious or false drug deliveries arrive from Far East countries but the knowledge of the country of dispatch alone does not necessarily result in opening of a small consignment or even of a big cargo by the National Tax and Customs Administration. A risk analyse is made, checking many features before opening a package, as only in this way they can process thousands of packages a day. In this paper we present the liquidation of a criminal gang in Hungary, whose members made their names memorable in the law enforcement ledger by production and distribution of desire and performance enhancers.

The Management of Youth Involvement in Election Violence in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa: Causes, Issues, Actors and Management

This study examined the management of youth involvement in election violence in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State, Nigeria. All violence linked to election is mostly perpetrated by the youths who are not only in the service of the politicians but also financed by them so long as they do the biddings. The study adopted a descriptive survey design. Data was collected through primary and secondary sources. A total of 125 questionnaire were administered and 110 retrieved for analysis using SPSS 21. Poor implementation of electoral laws, lack of self-confidence of politicians, difficult environmental terrain, godfatherism, proliferation of small and light weapons cause violence during elections in the study area. Ex-militant and other criminal gangs, the independent National Electoral Commission and Security personnel are the major actors in election violence in the study area. The creation of skill acquisition programmes, sensitization and legal framework designed for combating electoral violence, address the issue of youth involvement in election violence, and difficult terrain, no access roads, inaccessibility of police stations in the area, poor communication network are clog on the wheel of managing youth involvement in election violence in the study area. Adequate empowerment programs must be put in place for youths; government should establish more security posts in the study area. State and federal government should construct more roads to link the area together. The role most youths perform in the political and electoral process is violent in nature and that youths are vulnerable instrument of electoral violence.

The Proliferation of Criminal Gang Activities on the Cape Flats and the Subsequent Legislative and Policy Responses

The proliferation of criminal gang activity is inextricably linked to the lingering legacy of the apartheid regime. Decades after apartheid, the communities of the Cape Flats in the Western Cape face a continuous onslaught of violence, predominantly brought about by rival gangs competing for drug territories. The purpose of this contribution is to consider the government’s policy and legislative responses to gangsterism through a historical and constitutional paradigm. The contribution, first, provides a brief historical overview of the causative (especially legislative and socio-economic) factors that led to the proliferation of criminal gangs on the Cape Flats. Secondly, it investigates the violent reality of criminal gang activity in a postdemocratic South Africa. This part also focuses on the legislative response to organised crime, in particular chapter 4 of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act 121 of 1998 (which deals with criminal gang activity), as well as on the various interventions and policies by the national and Western Cape Government to address the challenges related to gangsterism.

Determination of the Association of Qualitative Variables Related to Juvenile Delinquency Factors

The present study describes the main associations between the occurrence of crimes of robbery, homicide, assault, and vandalism in the face of exposure to risk factors for juvenile delinquency, according to the literature consulted. For this, expert knowledge is processed through the AHP multi-criteria decision method and statistical analysis for data validation. A random selection of 350 files of minors under 21 years of age processed during the year 2021 for causes attributable to homicide, robbery, property damage, and assault was carried out, as well as a bibliographic review to determine the study variables to be analyzed. It was observed that drug consumption is associated with the occurrence of vandalism, homicides, and robberies. Likewise, a statistically significant association was observed between belonging to criminal gangs and the occurrence of vandalism and robbery. The analysis carried out revealed the existence of significant relationships in terms of exposure to violent housing environments and the performance of robbery, vandalism, and assault in the young defendants. It was possible to observe the existence of a certain degree of association between child abuse and the occurrence of robbery and assault.

Deploying Public Private Partnership (PPP) in Understanding the Missing Link and Requisite Legal Regime to Resolve the Almajiri System Challenge

The various efforts of the Federal Government and its agencies together with international institutions at integrating the Almajiri education into contemporary education in Nigeria or mainstreaming the Almajiri system into the nation’s educational system have not achieved the desired objectives. The failure of relevant policy makers could be traced to their solution-strategies, which did not give adequate considerations to the historical realities of the Almajiri system; to the constitutional obligation of government to provide free and compulsory basic education to its school age citizens; and to a genuine stakeholder buy-in of Almajiri school operators. Using a doctrinal research methodology that leaned more on official narrative, institutional publications as well as Internet resources and online blogs, the paper looked at Almajiri concept, reviewed the legal framework underpinning basic education rights in Nigeria, and explored the various attempts at mainstreaming the Almajiri system. The paper discovered that the solution-strategies to deal with the Almajiri challenge are premised on a jaundiced notion of the Almajiri system, which is commonly viewed as a source of terrorists and criminal gangs recruitments, and the underestimation of the capacity of Almajiri school operators to lead the process. The paper found that the risk analyses of the solution strategies were not adequate and comprehensive enough with the attendant consequence of increased suspicion between the government and Almajiri school operators. The paper therefore recommended a partnership arrangement built on mutual respect among the three stakeholders, namely, the government, the Almajiri school operators and the Almajiri parents as well as a partnership on the basis of shared responsibilities, shared resources and shared rewards under which the operators or their immediate communities will take a commanding heights in the operation and management of the Almajiri schools. This type of arrangement is a good candidate for Pro-Poor Public Private Partnership (PPPPP), which is commonly used in many jurisdictions to serve the neglected part of the populations. In this respect, the paper recommends the Charter School model, which the United States established to cater for the educationally underserved and neglected among its citizens. If implemented, the twin incidences of out-of-school children and Almajiri Street begging will greatly reduced, thereby positively impacting to the social, political and economic sectors of the Nigerian society.

EUROPOL’S NEW MANDATE: BETWEEN SECURITY AND CIVIL FREEDOMS

The article presents the EU Commission’s legislative initiative to amend the current Regulation of 2016, which defines powers and functions of the EU Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol). The author cites the arguments used by the EU Commission in its decision to expand the functions and powers of the agency: the successful acquisition of new technologies by criminal gangs, the challenges of digital threats for law enforcement and judicial agencies of Member States, which find it difficult at the national level to properly process big data for the investigation of cross-border crimes. The article analyses the main thematic blocks of the new Regulation: enabling Europol to cooperate in the fight against criminal offenses with private parties; empowering the agency to carry out preliminary processing of big and complex databases; strengthening the role of Europol in the field of research and innovation; enabling Europol to enter alerts into the Schengen Information System, etc. The author believes that the expansion of Europol's operational powers brings it one step closer to the «European FB», i.e., an organization of a supranational nature. At the same time, the author cites the arguments of the reform’s opponents, including the political groups of the European Parliament and human rights organisations, which can be divided into two groups: a) under the pretext of ensuring security, the Commission legalises the current practice of Europol, which has gone beyond its current mandate, b) the new functions of the agency for processing a big data pose a threat to the citizens’ rights.

‘The Men Watching Our Borders’: The Evolution, Identity, and Tenacity of Chinkororo in Gusii, Kenya

Non-state armed groups have been the subject of research in Kenya for a long time. Many of them emerge in response to social, political, and economic inequalities and the dissatisfactions they engender. Kenyan society is marked by unemployment, a huge gap between the rich and the poor, and marginalization due to ethnic-based politics. As a result, almost every region in Kenya has registered at least one instance of activity by a non-state armed group. These groups have posed a continuous threat to the social and political spheres of Kenya and were banned under the Kenyan Prevention of Organized Crime Act of 2010. However, many of them are still active. The author focuses here on the Chinkororo movement in Kisii county. There exist competing perspectives on the role of Chinkororo: it is viewed as a group of traditional warriors from Abagusii, a criminal gang, a vigilante for economic and political hire by the highest bidder, or even a security provider filling the government’s security gaps. The author outlines the history and activities of Chinkororo and the reasons for its continuing vibrancy despite a government ban through the enactment of the Prevention of Organized crime Act. The paper argues that Chinkororo is, in fact, a vigilante that transitioned from being a simple neighbourhood formation to a political and economic instrument for violent post-election score-settling. Its activities come more into the limelight during electioneering periods. Accordingly, it is hard to extinguish Chinkororo’s activities because of constant election-related violence in Kenya.

Crisis responses, opportunity, and public authority during Covid-19's first wave in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and South Sudan.

Discussions on African responses to Covid‐19 have focused on the state and its international backers. Far less is known about a wider range of public authorities, including chiefs, humanitarians, criminal gangs, and armed groups. This paper investigates how the pandemic provided opportunities for claims to and contests over power in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and South Sudan. Ethnographic research is used to contend that local forms of public authority can be akin to miniature sovereigns, able to interpret dictates, policies, and advice as required. Alongside coping with existing complex protracted emergencies, many try to advance their own agendas and secure benefits. Those they seek to govern, though, do not passively accept the new normal, instead often challenging those in positions of influence. This paper assesses which of these actions and reactions will have lasting effects on local notions of statehood and argues for a public authorities lens in times of crisis.

Vehicle Consumption, Theft and Smuggling in the Texas-Mexico Border, 1930–1960

My work studies how the construction of international highways and the rise in automobile consumption in northern Mexico during the 1930s and 1940s facilitated the illegal entry of thousands of stolen cars from the United States and encouraged the expansion of vehicle theft in the U.S. Southwest. This illicit business exposed the vulnerability of the political border between the United States and Mexico. Likewise, I also study the efforts of both governments (the United States and Mexico) to stop this illegal activity and the response of transnational criminal gangs to adapt to the increasing intervention of the State on the border.

Criminal networks analysis in missing data scenarios through graph distances

Data collected in criminal investigations may suffer from issues like: (i) incompleteness, due to the covert nature of criminal organizations; (ii) incorrectness, caused by either unintentional data collection errors or intentional deception by criminals; (iii) inconsistency, when the same information is collected into law enforcement databases multiple times, or in different formats. In this paper we analyze nine real criminal networks of different nature (i.e., Mafia networks, criminal street gangs and terrorist organizations) in order to quantify the impact of incomplete data, and to determine which network type is most affected by it. The networks are firstly pruned using two specific methods: (i) random edge removal, simulating the scenario in which the Law Enforcement Agencies fail to intercept some calls, or to spot sporadic meetings among suspects; (ii) node removal, modeling the situation in which some suspects cannot be intercepted or investigated. Finally we compute spectral distances (i.e., Adjacency, Laplacian and normalized Laplacian Spectral Distances) and matrix distances (i.e., Root Euclidean Distance) between the complete and pruned networks, which we compare using statistical analysis. Our investigation identifies two main features: first, the overall understanding of the criminal networks remains high even with incomplete data on criminal interactions (i.e., when 10% of edges are removed); second, removing even a small fraction of suspects not investigated (i.e., 2% of nodes are removed) may lead to significant misinterpretation of the overall network.

INFLUENCE OF THE PERFORMANCE OF NATIONAL POLICE SERVICE IN PREVENTION OF ORGANIZED CRIMES IN MOMBASA COUNTY, KENYA

This paper uses data collected for an MA Thesis on influence of the Performance of National Police Service in Prevention of organized Crimes in Mombasa County, Kenya. The study was necessitated by continued rise of criminal gangs despite police service efforts to contain the problem. The study was guided by three specific objectives, but for this paper first and second objectives will be discussed. First, the examined the influence of resource capacity on the performance of national police service in prevention of organized crimes in Mombasa County. Secondly, the study examined the influence of motivation on the performance of national police service in prevention of organized crimes. Thirdly, the last objective assessed the influence of external environment on the performance of National Police Service in prevention of organized crimes in Mombasa County, Kenya. The survey utilized Expectancy theory and Crime Pattern Theory and adopted a descriptive research design employing a mixed method paradigm.
 The study sample size comprised 306 National Police Service officers (NPS); Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) officers, Kenya Police service (KP), and Administration Police (AP) officers both senior and junior. Qualitative data was analyzed using thematic analysis derived from the study objectives. On the other hand, quantitative data was analyzed through descriptive statistics. According to the findings, 17% of the police officers still undertake operations without intelligence briefing, and that despite the availability of criminal intelligence. Besides, access to criminal intelligence was still a major challenge to 45% of the officers while inter-agency coordination was a rare part of the fight against organized crime to 56% of the officers who were not involved. The findings also revealed that despite the importance of training towards the prevention of organized crime, 33% of police officers did not have access to these trainings. Furthermore, 53% of the officers, cited lack of recognition and motivation that could go a long way in raising performance of the police officers. The study makes two major recommendations; special attention to training and curriculum review that addresses the demands of emerging global security challenges. Secondly, officer’s welfare remains a thorny issue which can potentially stifle any crime prevention initiative. Welfare issues of concern such as merit and fairness in promotions, rewards and other incentives, and better compensation were said to be an integral part of any serious police reform agenda.

Penanganan Diversi Anak sebagai Tersangka dalam Tindak Pidana Pencurian Kenderaan Bermotor pada Polres Sibolga

The research objective is to analyze the rule of law in the application of diversion to children; the factors causing the criminal act of theft of motorized vehicles by children and the diversion policy against child suspects in the crime of theft of motorized vehicles at the Sibolga Resort Police. The research method used is descriptive method, while the data analysis technique uses descriptive qualitative. The results of the study indicate that the rule of law in the application of diversion to children who commit criminal acts is regulated in Law No. 11 of 2012 concerning the Juvenile Criminal Justice System, namely in articles 6 – 15 and Law no. 35 of 2014 concerning Child Protection, namely article 1 number (2). Factors causing the theft are internal factors, namely economic factors where children come from families of weak economic groups, lack of parental supervision because they are busy at work, lack of legal awareness by children because they are still not mature in thinking, narcotics needs because they are wrong in the association of friends, external factors are the opportunity to commit theft, the influence of the environment where children are connected to criminal groups or motorcycle gangs, the influence of adults who try to take advantage of children to commit theft of motorized vehicles, and the number of collectors of stolen motorized vehicles. The diversion policy against child suspects in the crime of motor vehicle theft at the Sibolga Resort Police is carried out by means of formal and non-formal policies.

Challenges of money laundering for sovereign states that uses the US dollar

PurposeThere has been almost no scholarly work on the challenges of money laundering in sovereign states that use the US dollar as their currency of choice. This study aims to break the silence by highlighting how money laundering thrives in these situations mainly due to lack of or weak regulation of the US dollar by both the adopting states and the USA.Design/methodology/approachThe research depended on various secondary data sources. It is an adapted academic version of a shorter piece for a professional magazine for professionals in the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Field.FindingsPreliminary findings show that due to the lack of regulation of the US dollar in dollarized economies, unscrupulous politicians, organized criminal gangs and multinational corporations among others can use a variation of the Black Market Peso Exchange (BMPE) to counteract money laundering controls and launder ill-gotten gains from crimes such as corruption, transnational crimes and tax evasion. Furthermore, ordinary citizens, migrant workers and small businesses avoiding stringent exchange rates are also using the black market, posing a further challenge to the law enforcement authorities.Practical implicationsThe practical implications of this paper relate to how the mutations of money laundering techniques, as they are adopted by criminals, to operate in different conditions are making it difficult not only to dictate but also to address using traditional AML techniques.Social implicationsBMPE has far reaching social consequences. Hence, this study is significant to instigate a search for solutions and for further detailed studies into the money laundering techniques in countries that do not have a sovereign currency.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper to discuss the unique challenges faced by countries that have adopted the US dollar for domestic use. The paper also shows how dollarization is a modest reminder that money laundering technique such as the BMPE can evolve to counter the legislative and regulatory environment of the various jurisdictions in which they are laundered.

Recidivism into Criminal Gangs as a Problem of Social Identity—Some Applications from the Perspective of Pragmatism

AbstractMany measures have been taken to counter recidivism into gang criminality, amongst other the efforts to prevent arrested gang members to return to their gangs after imprisonment. Whereas the conditions for successful intervention may be hard to unravel, this article will claim that some efforts may be destined to failure by default, because they do not adequately address issues of social identity as a central part of the problem, e.g. replacing one identity with another when leaving one community to establish a meaningful life in another. This article presents some views on social identity from the standpoint of pragmatism and demonstrates how their application on recidivism into gang-related crime reveals problematic issues for social work. To that end, this article takes departure in outlaw-biker communities as illustrative example and make use of two interviews with former presidents of a well-known club.

Criminal networks analysis in missing data scenarios through graph distances.

Data collected in criminal investigations may suffer from issues like: (i) incompleteness, due to the covert nature of criminal organizations; (ii) incorrectness, caused by either unintentional data collection errors or intentional deception by criminals; (iii) inconsistency, when the same information is collected into law enforcement databases multiple times, or in different formats. In this paper we analyze nine real criminal networks of different nature (i.e., Mafia networks, criminal street gangs and terrorist organizations) in order to quantify the impact of incomplete data, and to determine which network type is most affected by it. The networks are firstly pruned using two specific methods: (i) random edge removal, simulating the scenario in which the Law Enforcement Agencies fail to intercept some calls, or to spot sporadic meetings among suspects; (ii) node removal, modeling the situation in which some suspects cannot be intercepted or investigated. Finally we compute spectral distances (i.e., Adjacency, Laplacian and normalized Laplacian Spectral Distances) and matrix distances (i.e., Root Euclidean Distance) between the complete and pruned networks, which we compare using statistical analysis. Our investigation identifies two main features: first, the overall understanding of the criminal networks remains high even with incomplete data on criminal interactions (i.e., when 10% of edges are removed); second, removing even a small fraction of suspects not investigated (i.e., 2% of nodes are removed) may lead to significant misinterpretation of the overall network.