Post by Bozur on Jan 5, 2008 23:05:47 GMT -5
Global Crime Statistics & Syndicates.
Description;
Crime in the United States is bottoming out after a steep slide downward during the past decade. But crime in many other nations--particularly in eastern and parts of western Europe--has continued to climb. In the United States, street crime overall remains near historic lows, prompting some analysts to declare life in the United States safer than it has ever been. In fact, statistics show that, despite terrorism, the world as a whole seems to be becoming safer. This is in sharp contrast to the perceptions of Americans and others, as polls indicate they believe the world gets more dangerous every day.
Current Crime Rates Around the World
Although the United States still has more violent crime than other industrialized nations and still ranks high in overall crime, the nation has nevertheless been experiencing a decline in crime numbers. Meanwhile, a number of European countries are catching up; traditionally low-crime societies, such as Denmark and Finland, are near the top in street crime rates today. Other countries that weren't even on the crime radar--such as Japan--are also experiencing a rise in crime.
Comparing crime rates across countries is difficult (see sidebar "The Trouble with Crime Statistics"). Different definitions of crimes, among other factors, make official crime statistics notoriously unreliable. However, the periodic World Crime Survey, a UN initiative to track global crime rates, may offer the most reliable figures currently available:
* Overall crime (homicide, rape, major assault, robbery) and property crime. The United States in 1980 clearly led the Western world in overall crime and ranked particularly high in property crime. A decade later, statistics show a marked decline in U.S. property crime. By 2000, overall crime rates for the U.S. dropped below those of England and Wales, Denmark, and Finland, while U.S. property-crime rates also continued to decline.
* Homicide. The United States had consistently higher homicide rates than most Western nations from 1980 to 2000. In the 1990s, the U.S. rate was cut almost in half, but the 2000 rate of 5.5 homicides per 100,000 people was still higher than all nations except those in political and social turmoil. Colombia, for instance, had 63 homicides per 100,000 people; South Africa, 51.
* Rape. In 1980 and 1990, U.S. rape rates were higher than those of any Western nation, but by 2000, Canada took the lead. The lowest reported rape rates were in Asia and the Middle East.
* Robbery has been on a steady decline in the United States over the past two decades. As of 2000, countries with more reported robberies than the United States included England and Wales, Portugal, and Spain. Countries with fewer reported robberies include Germany, Italy, and France, as well as Middle Eastern and Asian nations.
* Burglary, usually considered the most serious property crime, is lower in the United States today than it was in 1980. As of 2000, the United States had lower burglary rates than Australia, Denmark, Finland, England and Wales, and Canada. It had higher reported burglary rates than Spain, Korea, and Saudi Arabia.
* Vehicle theft declined steadily in the United States from 1980 to 2000. The 2000 figures show that Australia, England and Wales, Denmark, Norway, Canada, France, and Italy all have higher rates of vehicle theft.
Overall, the United States crime rate appears to be dropping it is, however, turning into a police state. Security with a heavy loss of individual freedoms!
Global Crime Syndicates Target U.S. From Canada - Chinese Gangs Brief Article - Statistical Data Included
Federal law-enforcement agencies fear `a growing threat' from Russian, Japanese and especially Chinese crooks who establish residency in Canada, then exploit loose immigration policies.
Chinese gangs from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau increasingly are using Canada as a base for operations in the United States and now constitute "a growing threat" to this nation, according to the International Crime Threat Assessment. The 128-page analysis of criminal activity worldwide, produced by the CIA, the National Security Council, the FBI and specialists from 10 other federal agencies, reports that tough, sophisticated Chinese gangsters are exploiting Ottawa's comparatively loose immigration policies to enter Canada and become legal residents. As Canadian residents, they can easily enter and leave the United States, where they run major criminal enterprises. The Chinese gangs principally engage in heroin trafficking, credit-card fraud, software piracy and assorted high-tech crimes. But they diligently pursue more traditional activities, too, and operate alien-smuggling, vehicle-theft, money-laundering and gun-running rings.
"The international criminal threat posed by ethnic Chinese criminal networks has become more complex as crime groups originating in mainland China have joined the traditional triad societies of Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan" in expanding beyond China's borders, the report states. Such secret triads, which date from the 17th century, have established relationships throughout the Pacific Rim and the Western Hemisphere and are adept at using what the report calls "traditional Chinese practices of networking" to facilitate criminal activity.
Intelligence estimates put total membership in the triads at more than 100,000, a figure that includes "quasi-legitimate businessmen involved in an array of criminal enterprises." Hong Kong has produced two of the most powerful triads: One is called 14K; the other is the Sun Yee On triad. Both have branches in Canada. The 14K is based in Toronto, maintains a chapter in New York and operates in other U.S. cities. Sun Yee On members have settled in Toronto, as well as Edmonton, Alberta, and Vancouver, British Columbia, and operate in the United States.
But China's biggest, most expansive and successful triad is the Big Circle Gang, which has cells around the world, including Canada. Since first appearing in the United States in the early 1990s, it has set up cells in New York, Boston, Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles. "The Big Circle Gang is responsible for importing much of the Southeast Asian heroin entering Canada -- much of which is then smuggled into the United States -- and is the source for many of the counterfeit credit cards used in North America" the report states.
The more loosely organized Russian crooks in the United States primarily busy themselves with extortion, drug trafficking, auto theft, cigarette smuggling and trafficking in stolen art. They are major providers of services such as money laundering and work at securing drugs for the Russian market.
"Russian criminal organizations in the United States are adept at moving funds through a global complex of front companies, offshore financial-service centers and crime-controlled banks to facilitate extraction of criminal proceeds originating in Russia, as well as to launder funds generated from "U.S.based criminal operations" say the agencies.
Money-laundering is a favorite activity of Japanese outlaws, too. But in the United States, they tend to do it by investing in the stock market and U.S. financial institutions. They also invest heavily in Canadian and U.S. real estate and are known to own golf courses and hotels, among other holdings. They make considerable money through drug-and arms-trafficking, extortion and investment fraud and have purchased large swatches of West Coast and Hawaiian real estate.
SOURCE: CIA Bureau of Statistics
www.travelersdigest.com/global_crime.htm