Reporting from Ilopango: El Salvador’s First Peace Zone
El Faro tells the story of Ilopango's first month as a "violence-free" municipality, after it was named as the first "peace zone" to be launched as part of El Salvador's gang…
Peña Nieto Reveals 2014 Security Budget
Peña Nieto's proposed $4.4 billion security spending plan for 2014 allots over a third of its budget to crime prevention.
Honduran Supreme Court Backs Police Director Amid Death Squad Claims
The president of the Honduran Supreme Court (CSJ) has said the nation's police director, mired in controversy over allegations that he was involved in extrajudicial killings, has never been…
40% More Poppy Grown in Mexico than Marijuana: Govt
The area of poppy crops eradicated in Mexico last year exceeded that of marijuana by 40 percent, according to official figures, indicating shifts in drug production and trafficking patterns.
UN Approves Global Arms Trade Treaty
The United Nations General Assembly has approved the first global arms trade treaty, which attempts to regulate cross-border weapons transfers and prevent the sale of weapons to human rights…
Will Meth Overtake Cocaine on the Southwest Border?
In recent years, the United States Border Patrol has seen methamphetamine seizures increase and cocaine seizures decrease as Mexican cartels flood the US market with cheap, powerful versions of the…
Colombia Faces Growing Challenges in Micro-trafficking and Illegal Mining
As President Juan Manuel Santos declared a new offensive against Colombia's micro-trafficking, a new report reveals the depth of the country's illegal mining trade, highlighting two of Colombia's principal security…
Venezuela Presidential Candidates Promise Action on Security
Venezuela's interim president and socialist party presidential candidate Nicolas Maduro has blamed the country's crime and violence problems on capitalism, and his rival Henrique Capriles led a march calling for…
Mexico Crime Tracking Social Media Page Disappears
A Facebook page known as "Valor x Tamaulipas" and its Twitter account, both of which tracked crime in the embattled state by the same name, have been taken down following…
Brazilian Police Arrested After Murder of São Paulo Teens
Eight São Paulo military police have been arrested following the release of video footage showing the murder of two adolescents, in what appears to be an example of the type…
Red Command
The Red Command (Comando Vermelho) is Brazil’s oldest criminal group, created in a Rio de Janeiro prison in the 1970s as a self-protection group for prisoners. It started out with…
Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, alias ‘Nem’
Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, alias “Nem,” led the Amigos dos Amigos gang in Rocinha, a neighborhood of some 150,000 residents in the southern part of Rio de Janeiro that is…
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InSight Crime Events – Border Crime: The Northern Triangle and Tri-Border Area
Through several rounds of extensive field investigations, our researchers have analyzed and mapped out the main illicit economies and criminal groups present in 39 border departments spread across the six countries of study – the Northern Triangle trio of Guatemala, Honduras, and El…
InSight Crime’s ‘Memo Fantasma’ Investigation Wins Simón Bolívar National Journalism Prize
The staff at InSight Crime was awarded the prestigious Simón Bolívar national journalism prize in Colombia for its two-year investigation into the drug trafficker known as “Memo Fantasma,” which was…
InSight Crime – From Uncovering Organized Crime to Finding What Works
This project began 10 years ago as an effort to address a problem: the lack of daily coverage, investigative stories and analysis of organized crime in the Americas. …
InSight Crime – Ten Years of Investigating Organized Crime in the Americas
In early 2009, Steven Dudley was in Medellín, Colombia. His assignment: speak to a jailed paramilitary leader in the Itagui prison, just south of the city. Following his interview inside…
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