The networks of drug offenders

Abstract

The serious drug and drug smuggling offenders active in Stockholm are linked by means of co-offending to other persons in large criminal networks. Within these networks, the individuals have large numbers of superficial and transient contacts with one another. It appears to be particularly important to have contacts with other drug offenders throughout Sweden, and particularly in the Skåne region. The majority of the convicted drug offenders have a Nordic background. The study indicates that dealers in the Stockholm area know drug smugglers in Sweden's metropolitan areas. In their turn, the drug smugglers in the metropolitan areas have contacts with persons involved in the smuggling of other goods primarily in the county of Skåne. A large proportion of the persons included in the data set were suspected of committing drug offences and appear to be focused to some extent on drug offending and on offences involving one or two illicit substances. They also engage in other types of criminal activity to a large extent, however, and are thus not exclusively specialised in drug offending. Persons involved in serious drug crime, including drug smuggling, are often males in their thirties. These individuals often choose other males as co-offenders. It is generally common to commit drug offences together with co-offenders and the most criminally active individuals are also those with the largest numbers of co-offenders. The co-offending partnerships that commit drug offences are not particularly durable over time, however, and it is unusual for drug offenders to restrict themselves to committing offences with one and the same co-offender.

Illuminating dark networks: a social network analysis of an Australian drug trafficking syndicate

“…Our SNA of an Australian methamphetamine trafficking network produced valuable insights into network size, roles, interactions and synergies, structure and leadership, as well as network vulnerabilities to law enforcement intervention. These insights were consistent with those produced from SNA of criminal networks in other countries using offender databases, transcripts of physical or electronic surveillance (e.g., wire taps) and court proceedings (e.g., [6,[14][15][16]). The only study to attempt an SNA with police interrogation data found it inadequate for the task.…”

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“…The first category of data is offender databases which typically include the names, criminal histories, and other details of known offenders. We have identified three previous studies that have used offender databases, with access provided by law enforcement agencies, to conduct SNA [5,15,18]. In one study [15], the researchers calculated changes over time in the percentage of connections between a core group of 127 offenders convicted of drug trafficking and a peripheral group of approximately 8,000 co-offenders.…”

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“…Generally speaking, social network analysis has proven to be well suited for bringing to light the structures and functioning principles of any kind of organization, ranging from groups as different as terrorists (Krebs ), organized criminals (Heber ), publicizing scholars (Barabási et al ; Newman ) or indeed politicians. In this latter regard, we completely agree with McClurg and Lazer's statement that “Politics is, at its core, a network phenomenon” (2014, 1).…”

A Network Analysis Approach to the Diffusion of Tolerance Memes

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