Latest Organized crime News
The first US Peace Corps volunteers return to El Salvador since leaving in 2016 because of violence
SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — U.S. Peace Corps volunteers returned to El Salvador Friday for the first time since the American force left in 2016 because of violence in the Central American country. It was the latest sign of a thaw in U.S. relations with El Salvador, whose...
The EU judicial cooperation agency is stepping up its fight against organized crime
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The European Union's judicial cooperation agency, Eurojust, launched a new network on Wednesday to strengthen and further coordinate the continent's fight against organized crime. The European Judicial Organised Crime Network's first priority will be...
Tren de Aragua gang started in Venezuela's prisons and now spreads fear in the US
MIAMI (AP) — Former federal agent Wes Tabor says his phone has been lighting up with calls from police departments around the U.S. for advice on how to combat the growing threat from the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Tabor was in charge of the U.S. Drug Enforcement...
Families from Tennessee to California seek humanitarian parole for adopted children in Haiti
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — At only 6 years old, Esai Reed has endured three emergency evacuations from orphanages across Haiti as gangs pillage and plunder their way through once peaceful communities. He is now in northern Haiti under the care of a U.S. organization after the...
As UN meets, Haitians express hopelessness at finding an international solution to gang crisis
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — As world leaders meeting in the United Nations this week discuss the future of efforts to rein in the gangs strangling Haiti, Haitians are expressing hopelessness that an international response can turn the tide of violence. Thus far, a UN-backed force...
Haiti's insecurity is worsening as gangs seize more territory, UN rights expert says
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — A U.N. human rights expert warned on Friday that gang violence is spreading across Haiti as a U.N.-backed mission targeting criminals in the troubled Caribbean country remains underfunded and understaffed. Haiti’s National Police still lack the...
Police fatally shoot a blasphemy suspect in Pakistan in 2nd such killing in a week
KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — Police in southern Pakistan shot dead a blasphemy suspect during an alleged shootout with armed men, officials said Thursday, the second such apparent extra-judicial killing in a week, drawing condemnation from human rights groups. Police identified the...
Sweden charges a woman with war crimes for allegedly torturing Yazidi women and children in Syria
COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — Swedish authorities on Thursday charged a 52-year-old woman associated with the Islamic State group with genocide, crimes against humanity and serious war crimes against Yazidi women and children in Syria — the first such case on trial in the Scandinavian country. ...
Dominican and US officials crack down on regional drug trafficking ring
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic (AP) — U.S. and Dominican officials on Wednesday arrested nearly a dozen suspects after they launched a joint operation to crack down on a regional drug trafficking ring. Officials with the Dominican Republic’s Anti-Drug Agency and agents with...
Congo court sentences 3 Americans and 34 others to death on coup charges
KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — A military court in Congo handed down death sentences Friday to 37 people, including three Americans, after convicting them on charges of participating in a coup attempt. The defendants, most of them Congolese but also including a Briton, Belgian and...