Organized Crime

The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Thursday blacklisted a Mexican human-smuggling ring, imposing sanctions against four individuals and 16 companies it says helped illegally migrate to the United States.  The Cancun-based Bhardwaj Human Smuggling Organization has illicitly transported thousands of people from Europe, the Middle East, South America, and Asia […]

Belgium is in danger of evolving into a “narco-state” as organized crime penetrates key institutions and exploits Antwerp’s giant port to smuggle cocaine into Europe, an investigating judge warned in an open letter cited by the Financial Times.

A former Citibank relationship manager has pleaded guilty and been sentenced to two years in jail for helping a Chinese criminal network launder money in Singapore, the Financial Times reported. 

One of Mexico’s most powerful drug cartels is smuggling gasoline and diesel into the Port of Ensenada with the aid of a “dark fleet” tanker and a Houston-based company, according to an investigation by Reuters. 

A Peruvian judge declined a request to restrict former President Dina Boluarte from leaving the country while prosecutors investigate her for corruption and money laundering, Reuters reported. 

U.S. and UK authorities seized roughly $15 billion in Bitcoin and multiple London properties allegedly linked to a sprawling online fraud scheme based in Cambodia.

One of the world’s oldest marketplaces is doubling as a modern hub for sanctions evasion and large-scale money laundering, according to experts who spoke to The New York Post.

The son of a Chinese-born Uyghur oligarch who allegedly ran a massive smuggling and money-laundering ring has purchased a former church in North London for more than $3 million and converted it into a mosque and cultural center, OCCRP reported. 

Illegal gold mining has grown into one of the Western Hemisphere’s largest and fastest‑expanding illicit economies, out‑earning narcotics in parts of Colombia and Peru and pushing conflict‑linked gold toward U.S. ports and banks. 

A previously undisclosed report by the Inspector General for the U.S. State Department and officials interviewed by ProPublica allege that former Ambassador to El Salvador Ronald D. Johnson protected Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele from American and Salvadoran law enforcement efforts.