The latest Europol Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment is not good, but it does include the UK.
The UK may no longer be a member of the EU but the latest European Union Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment (SOCTA), published every four years by Europol offers a stark reminder what Western Europe is up against and this includes the UK although not specified in the report.
Indeed the report’s findings suggests that serious and organised crime has never posed as high a threat to the EU and its citizens as it does today. More than 5,000 OCGs operating on an international level are currently under investigation in the 27 countries that make up the EU.
The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent economic and social fallout essentially paved the way to create ideal conditions for organised crime to spread and take hold in Western Europe and beyond. The agility of criminal networks, allowed them to adapt to and capitalise on changes in the environment in which they operate allowing them to change obstacles into criminal opportunities.
It’s suggested that the criminal network is run in a business like environment with a composition of managerial layers and field operators, surrounded by actors working mainly (40%) in drugs trafficking which remains the largest criminal business in the EU.
The assessment suggests that:-
Almost 60% of the criminal networks are reportedly engaged in corruption.
Criminals make and launder billions of euros annually, the scale and complexity of which has previously been underestimated. Indeed professional money launderers have now established a parallel underground financial system that infiltrates and undermines many of Europe’s economies and societies.
Legal business structures are used to facilitate all types of criminal activity with an impact on the EU.
Over 80% of the criminal networks that are currently active in the EU use legal business structures to hide their activities.
The use of violence by criminals involved in serious and organised crime has increased in both frequency and severity. The threat from violent incidents has become more frequent as is the use of firearms or explosives in public spaces.
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Criminal activities now exploit encrypted communications to network ‘on line’ using social media and other instant messaging services to reach a larger audience to advertise illegal goods, or spread disinformation.
Whilst domestic and business burglaries, pick-pocketing and ATM attacks remain the most common forms of organised property crime used by cross-border organised criminal groups, motor vehicle crime is highly visible and has the potential to cause widespread feelings of insecurity.
Crimes in this category are often committed in the EU by highly mobile organised crime groups?that often exploit inferior criminal groups to create networks of contacts, anchor points and logistical support in order to carry out a significant number of offences in a region over a short period of time before moving on.
Organised vehicle crime in the UK is often investigated in isolation at a local level not allowing useful analysis to circulate nationally making these crimes harder to understand, detect and solve. Indeed many such cases are still classified as petty criminality without recognising the organised crime aspect.
The amount of stolen vehicles recovered in many EU countries in the last few years has dropped considerably indicating a shift from individual offenders to the more professional organised vehicle crime groups, who each have clients based in destination countries often requiring specific vehicles delivered either complete or in a stripped condition.
The findings of the SOCTA 2021 relied heavily on its own intelligence and that from its member states but gratifyingly it also utilised and exchanged information from countries outside the EU with working arrangements with Europol and one of these is the UK.
The request for more support to be given to the police in their fight against the organised vehicle gangs that operate freely here in the EU and the UK has been for some time the mantra of many operating daily at the coal face of this type of crime.
The UK lost 105,512 vehicles in 2021 and to date only 29,543 have been recovered.
This compares by comparison to Italy who lost 218,292, France lost 251,416 and Holland 85,700 each of which similar recovery rates.
Clearly from this SOCTA assessment indications are that organised crime gangs are taking much more interest and a firmer grip on the lucrative stolen vehicle market affording it a higher priority on their already comprehensive criminal portfolios.