Lehman sues over £177 million fraud

An interesting principle. If people claiming to be your "employees" [or even your employees] sell a fraudulent product, are you responsible for the losses suffered by the victim? Caveat Emptor really is dead and buried as a principle here. At least Lehman are suing in a Japanese court. they'd have won hands down in Manhattan...which begs the question. Why are they suing in Japan? Answers on a postcard please to Marubeni.

Monographs from Drug Policy Modelling Programme: Australia

Look like an interesting series of research papers and literature reviews from the University of New South Wales, including drug markets and calculating social costs per gram and per user of illegal drugs. Please add some comments on the quality of the papers if you get a chance to read them.

The Next Collapse Will be Russia's Last

Not at first apparent, the thread running through this Moscow Times article is that the rule of law is a necessary precondition for democracy and that there is a process by which this will emerge. I think Milton Friedman finally admitted that the rule of law should have preceded "shock therapy" in Eastern Europe...but somewhat too late. Those sharp-suited young idiots from Stanford with no experience of the world screwed it up for the populations of the former Soviet Bloc and handed the resources over to criminal groups instead. This article still centres on a form of economic determinism which needs needs to be thought through carefully.

Barroso slams Bulgaria over Corruption

President of European Commission tells Bulgarian government to take more of the initiative in fighting organised crime and corruption and to stop waiting for EU instructions before acting.

Call for papers: special issue of Global Crime

Global Crime invites contribution to the special issue “The Economics of Organized Crime”. The topic is purposely broad in scope, and hope to attract researchers from a diversity of fields. We welcome empirical studies which focus on the economic activities of organized crime groups, whether licit or illicit, or papers using economic theory or economic tools to analyze a specific activity or issue relating to organized crime. While all papers on the economic aspects of organized crime are welcome, three themes are of particular interest:

1. The circumstances where violence can be used by organized crime groups to control illegal or legal markets
2. Studies and analysis of new organized crime groups or new areas of organized crime ‘business’
3. The extent to which organized crime and terrorist groups overlap and the implications for the study and control of these groups.

The deadline to submit papers is September 15th, 2008. Guidelines for authors can be found at http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/authors/fglcauth.asp

Articles should be submitted electronically to one of the special issue Editors:

Martin Bouchard, PhD, Assistant Professor, School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, BC, Canada, V5A 1S6, mbouchard@sfu.ca

Dr. Chris Wilkins, PhD, Senior Researcher at Centre for Social Health Outcomes Research and Evaluation (SHORE), Massey University (NZ), c.wilkins@massey.ac.nz

50 arrests in police operation in South Devon

Looks as though there may have been a national operation going on against crime networks. Would be great if readers could send links to any local press reports of this sort. It follows on from the North London operation against loose networks yesterday. This one is called operation Toledo and brought in Avon and Somerset officers as back up. Burglary, vehicle crime, handling stolen goods and drugs were the offences listed

EU borderless zone expands at airports

Malta and 8 Eastern European EU states complete their joining of Schengen. It includes 22 EU member states, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland will join shortly. Uk and Ireland remain outside in name, although both have implemented over 85% of relevant measure in a piecemeal way. Ireland cannot join, because it has an open border with the UK. UK wont join because it wishes to present itself as having control over its borders for domestic political reasons.

Thieves leave car steal catalytic converter!

Platinum, palladium and rhodium in your catalytic converter. In an era of mineral shortage, they're much more valuable then gold. Yet another thing to worry about!

Report on Fraud Against Charities Suggests Huge Losses

New York Times article on report by four academics on fraud in the charitable sector. Overall cost of $40 billon in 2006, ie 13% of $600 billion donated. I will search for a link to full report.

Hundreds of Police Stage North London Raids

Part of an operation targetting loosely connected networks. Blackstock Road, close to Finsbury Park Mosque was suspected to be a venue for criminals of Algerian descent, with 19 businesses alleged to be involved. Drugs, stolen laptops and telephones the commodities traded. Maybe they'll find those missing databanks at last!
Dawn raids had also taken place at a number of premises across London.