1. CRIMINAL LAW 1. Ahmed T. Ghandour.

2. CRIMES OF POWERFUL.

3. 3. ORGAISED CRIME.

4. DEFINITION.  Organsed crime is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralised enterprises run by criminals who intend to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for money and profit.  Some criminal organisations, such as terrorist groups, are politically motivated.  Sometimes criminal organisations force people to do business with them, such as when a gang extorts money from shopkeepers for so-called "protection”.  Gangs may become disciplined enough to be considered organized.  A criminal organisation or gang can also be referred to as a mafia, mob, or crime syndicate; the network, subculture and community of criminals may be referred to as the underworld.

5. A SIMPLE DEFINITION.  Orgaised Crime:  The control, organization and distribution of illegal goods and serveries on national and international scale.

6. WHEN DOSE CRIME BECOME “ORGANIZED”?  Criminal acts such as murder, drug trafficking, prostitution, and money laundering become organized when they are conducted and controlled in a systemic way by groups of individuals on a national and international scale.  Criminal behavior is organised when the crime relies on the cooperation of a network of individuals who have beneficial relationship.

7. WHAT IS A TRANSNATIONAL ORGANISED CRIME ?  Transnational organised crime refers to unlawful activity undertaken and supported by organized criminal groups operating across national boundaries.

8. WHAT ARE THE CHARACTERISTICS OF ORGANISED CRIME?

9. 11 CHARACTERISTICS OF ORGANISED CRIME.  Organised crime has following important characteristics:  1. Team work:  It involves association of a group of criminals which is relatively permanent and may even last decades.  2. Hierarchical structure:  It has a structure with grades of authority from the lowest to the highest, involving a system of specifically defined relationships with mutual obligations and privileges.  3. Planning:  It involves advance arrangements for successfully committing crimes, minimising risks and insuring safety and protection.

10.  4. Centralised authority:  It functions on the basis of centralised control and authority which is vested either in the hands of one individual or a few members.  5. Reserved fund:  It maintains a reserve fund from profits which serves as capital for criminal enterprises, seeking help of the police, lawyers and even politicians, and for providing security to the arrested members and their families.  6. Specialisation:  Some groups specialise in just one crime while some others may be simultaneously engaged in multiple crimes. Those groups which are engaged in multiple crimes are more powerful and influential.  7. Division of labour:  Organised crime involves delegation of duties and responsibilities and specialisation of functions.

11.  8. Violence:  It depends upon use of force and violence to commit crimes and to maintain internal discipline and restrain external competition.  9. Monopoly:  It has expansive and monopolistic tendencies. Initially, organised criminal gangs operate in a limited area, and are engaged in a limited type of crime with a limited number of persons, but, gradually they expand into a wider range of activities extended over large geographical areas, involving a large number of carefully selected criminals.  In whatever area they operate, they secure monopoly in their criminal enterprises. They do not hesitate to use violence or threats of violence to eliminate competition.

12.  10. Protective measures:  It arranges permanent protection against interference from law- enforcement authorities and other agencies of government. The protective measures include contacts with policemen, lawyers, doctors, politicians, judges, and influential persons in society.  Giving money in cash or in gifts, providing help in elections, threatening their competitors, and arranging their (influential persons) foreign trips are some of the methods used by these gangs to secure protection and avoid arrest and conviction.  11. Conduct norms:  It frames rules of conduct, policies of administration, and methods of operation for members and for the operation of crime. This helps in maintaining discipline, efficiency, loyalty, obedience, and mutual confidence. Penalties are imposed for violating rules.

13. CRIME TODAY.

14. WHAT IS A COMPARATIVE CRIMINOLOGY ?

15. A DEFINITION.  Comparative criminology is the cross-cultural or cross-national study of crime and crime control, applying the comparative method in the science of criminology.  Today, in the "global village," circumstances have changed, and comparative criminologists have become a necessity. While many aspects of the global village are beneficial, others have brought great problems.  Along with economic commerce and trade, crime has also become international in scope. It is little wonder then that criminologists must look across borders to study crime and crime-control efforts, and to search for internationally acceptable solutions to common problems.

16.  Before the 1970s, there was little literature on comparative research in criminology. Since then, however, it has been growing rapidly, largely because of:  (1) a realisation that more can be learned about crime if theories are tested under diverse cultural conditions and,  (2) renewed interest in trying to discover what we can learn from the experience of other nations. Comparative criminology has both theoretical and practical goals.  Transnational criminality has led to a greater emphasis on international law and the establishment of a permanent international criminal court. In May 2002, a long-standing dream of establishing such a body became a reality, after more than 60 nations agreed to a Permanent International Court.

17. HOW DO WE USE A COMPARATIVE CRIMINOLOGY.  First when looking at crime as social behavior, criminologists develop and test theories about crime’s etiology that is, its causes, origins, and distribution.  Traditionally, those theories have been used to understand domestic crime in a particular country.  When theories about crime are developed and tested in or across two or more countries, criminology is more accurately called comparative criminology.

18. WHAT DO WE LEARN FROM COMPARATIVE CRIMINOLOGY.  When comparative criminologists study crim e as a social phenomenon, they try to identify commonalities and differences in crime pat terns among divergent cultures.  So the result of all of this is that crime statistics probably tell us as much about a country’s justice organisation as about its crime rate.

19. TRANSNATIONAL CRIMES.

20. DEFINITION.

21.  Transnational crimes are crimes that have actual or potential effect across national borders and crimes that are intra-state but offend fundamental values of the international community.  The term is commonly used in the law enforcement and academic communities.  Transnational organised crime (TOC) refers specifically to transnational crime carried out by crime organisations.  The word transnational describes crimes that are not only international (that is, crimes that cross borders between countries), but crimes that by their nature involve cross-border transmission as an essential part of the criminal activity.

22.  Transnational crimes also include crimes that take place in one country, but their consequences significantly affect another country and transit countries may also be involved. Examples of transnational crimes include: human trafficking, people smuggling, smuggling/trafficking of goods (such as arms trafficking and drug trafficking and illegal animal and plant products and other goods prohibited on environmental grounds (e.g. banned ozone depleting substances), sex slavery, terrorism offences, torture and apartheid.  Transnational crimes may also be crimes of customary international law or international crimes when committed in certain circumstances. For example, they may in certain situations constitute crimes against humanity.

23. TYPES OF TRANSNATIONAL CRIMES.