As a wave of coronavirus infections hit Italy in late March, Rocco Molè, a member of the country’s ’Ndrangheta organized crime group, was faced with a dilemma.As a wave of…
Officials from Bolivia's interim government have stepped up drug trafficking operations over the last six months, but a focus on coca-producing communities in Cochabamba is creating tension with law enforcement…
Criminal groups across Latin America have been forced to dig deep by the coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdown. Moving drugs and contraband, shaking down extortion victims and getting migrants across…
Though described as a strategy to keep traffickers from exploiting the coronavirus pandemic, the US Navy’s recent deployment of warships to the Caribbean was a long time in the making…
The coronavirus pandemic has halted trafficking in Peru and sent cocaine prices plummeting, but drug seizures continue in the border department of Ucayali, a jungle region that has become a major smuggling corridor…
At daybreak on January 1, 2020, five men were shot from a car with a machine gun mounted on it outside a church in Cieneguita, a small town located on…
To slow the spread of the coronavirus, Argentina -- a transhipment point and growing consumer market for illegal drugs -- has shut down its borders, instituted a mandatory quarantine, and…
Over the past year, repeated allegations of weak security and customs checks at Uruguay's main international airport in Montevideo have showcased its important role in the trafficking of drugs to…
In the investigation, "The Invisible Drug Lord: Hunting ‘The Ghost,’" InSight Crime reported that Colombia’s Vice President Marta Lucía Ramírez and her husband, Álvaro Rincón, were shareholders of Hitos Urbanos…
Crude oil siphoned from Colombia's pipelines is increasingly being processed by clandestine refineries that manufacture a low-quality fuel, known as "pategrillo," used to make cocaine.
US prosecutors have charged Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his closest allies with drug trafficking and corruption, cementing the embattled nation's reputation as a mafia state.
In Putumayo, as in much of Colombia, female coca growers face a difficult choice: obey armed groups and continue working in illegal economies, or put themselves at risk by seeking…