UK: Fighting organised crime

The University of Glasgow is to undertake collaboration with law enforcement authorities in Britain by creating the UK's first Institute for the Study of Serious Organised Crime. Researchers from the university will work closely with law enforcement to tackle organised crime issues that threaten businesses on a daily basis.

Over the next two years, the institute will undertake work in the following areas:

* Analysing the structure of organised crime groups within Scotland;
* Working with a wide range of agencies to identify the threat that organised crime represents to Scottish business;
* Identifying the potential threat that serious organised crime poses at the legal and political level within Scotland;
* Providing consultative support to law enforcement agencies in identifying effective means for tackling organised crime in Scotland and identifying areas of public life that may be vulnerable to organised crime;
* Linking with colleagues in Europe and the US involved in tackling serious organised crime;
* Raising public awareness of the facts attached to serious organised crime and its impacts.

Professor Neil McKeganey, who has overall direction of the institute, said: "The development of the institute within the University of Glasgow represents a new and challenging area for research and it is important that academic research provides whatever assistance it can to those who are seeking to tackle the emerging threat of organised crime in Scotland."

The estimated cost of organised crime in the UK is roughly £20 billion a year (US$39 billion). The researchers will be looking at how drug crime generates linked crime such as money laundering, tax evasion and other crimes impacting on the economy.

Former Director General of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency, and head of the institute, Graeme Pearson, said: "Understanding how crime groups operate and organise themselves is at the heart of our future ability to disrupt and destroy them. The University of Glasgow has initiated the first bold step in a new area of work aimed at supporting the authorities in their efforts to combat the threat from criminality."

monica.dobie@uw-news.com