Essay About Organized Crime And Country Of Organized Crime

Programs & Policies; the United States Fight Against Organized CrimeJoin now to read essay Programs & Policies; the United States Fight Against Organized CrimeAbstractThe purpose of this thesis is to explore programs used by the United States Government in its attempt to rid the country of organized crime. An in-depth look into the history of La Cosa Nostra and their operations will be followed by examinations of governmental programs such as the Internal Revenue Service, Grants of Immunity, Witness Protection Program, Informants & Undercover Agents, and finally the RICO Act. Conclusions regarding the overall effectiveness of the programs will be made.

IntroductionCriminal activity permeates many aspects of American society. Crime is at a very high level in the United States, from small petty crime such as shop lifting to organized bank frauds exceeding millions of dollars. According to preliminary data released by the Federal Bureau of Investigations Uniform Crime Reporting Program, the number of Crime Index offenses reported to law enforcement during the first 6 months of 2002 increased 1.3 percent when compared to figures reported for the same period of 2001. The Crime Index, which is viewed by many as an indicator of the Nations crime experience, is comprised of violent crime offenses and property crime offenses.

One aspect of crime that has been an enduring problem for law enforcement officials since its adoption in the 1920’s is organized crime. The persistence of organized criminals to survive amid a numbers of governmental programs aimed for the solely for bring down their hierarchal structures has frustrated law enforcement agencies working on their cases. Today, organized crime is a threat to the citizens of the United States and it demands full attention from law enforcement agencies.

This research will explore some of the methods used by the United States Government to combat organized crime. Methods such as the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) involvement in fighting organized crime, grants of immunity, witness protection program, the use of informants, and the RICO Act will all be explored. Conclusions regarding the effectiveness of the United States fight against organized crime will be drawn.

This research will not only help draw a clearer picture of how effective the United States fight against organized crime is, but through in-depth analysis and discussion it will help to explain why or why not these tools are effective.

Before addressing the methods that have been used by the United States to fight organized crime, it is first important to define it. It is significant to first define organized crime because there are so many different interpretations and definitions of what it is. Because of this difficulty no major theory was able to be applied to organized crime. Most Americans first thoughts about organized crime are related directly to the Italian crime families (La Cosa Nostra), better known by terms such as the mafia or the mob (Abadinsky 1983).

What makes La Cosa Nostra, or any of its members for that matter, so distinct? Why are they referred to as part of organized crime? What separates this so called organized crime family from any other group of criminals? What do they have in common with other groups of criminals? While this research will address numerous types of organized crime, it is first important to recognize the ‘organization’ of La Cosa Nostra as it acts as an icon for all other organized crime groups in the United States. Organized crime groups inherit or try to adopt the Sicilian code, some with hopes of becoming a ‘made member’. It is critically important to first understand the history of the Italian mafia in order to understand it as synonymous with organized crime as a whole.

The Definition of an organized crime family

The term ‘monarch’ is frequently used to describe any mafia group. This term was coined in 1922, a few years after the dissolution of the Mexican Communist Party. During the 1980s, there was a gradual change in the concept of organized crime through the proliferation of the Italian mob. In 1992, the Italian Communist Party merged with the Mafia to establish what is now called the Italian Mafia, an Italian branch of the Italian Socialist Party (CSP) and based its rules on the Italian law of the Federation of Northern Italian Nations. As noted above, the Italian “Monarch” does not have the same family structure as the Italian “Cosa Nostra” — the family has been organized under the names “The Family” and “The Cosa Nostra.” In fact, some La Cosa Nostra members have been referred to as “Closers” — a term they use to refer to people who have become a part of this family.

A member of a La Cosa Nostra membership named, “Mafia member” can make any association with an individual or group of persons. This group is the most closely related group that many of us can identify with.

What Makes Organized Crime Different from Other Local Cultures?

The general tendency of some organized crime organizations to organize a particular group into a group has remained the same throughout history and into all forms of law enforcement. It began to change after the Spanish Revolution followed the collapse of the Italian Communist Party and after the Bolshevik Revolution. But today, groups of like-minded people continue to grow in number, their name has become associated with more and more common forms of organized crime: law enforcement, organized crime syndicates, and drug gangs.

The Italian Mafia

The Italian mafia is an important part of La Cosa Nostra and of the movement of its members. It exists to punish people for crime and to punish those who commit it without any accountability by any law or order they have set up. The Mafia is also known as a syndicate that is more closely tied to Italian organized crime than to any other group. This mafia was first established around the year of the fall of the Italian Communist Party after the collapse of the Sicilian Communist Party. The Italian Mafia was founded by the group’s leaders at some point before the collapse of the Italian Communist Party in 1999, with one major exception. In 1993, the Italian Mafia was dissolved altogether. All of its members remained under the supervision of the organization’s leader, and that group did not operate any more. The same group has operated with impunity in some of the largest and most organized and most successful states and is still operated by organized criminals, like the Mafia of Texas, the Mafia of the Dominican Republic, the Mafia of Mexico, and the Mafia of Romania. Many of the organizations listed here are no longer organized as of yet.

La Cosa Nostra (LCN), also known as the mafia or mob is made up of Italian-American crime “families”. These families have been operating in the United States since the time of prohibition in the 1920’s (Abadinsky 1981). In comparison to any other organized crime group, La Cosa Nostra possesses the greatest amount of concern and attention from the United States Criminal Justice System. Even though the La Cosa Nostra has been severely crippled by law enforcement and challenged in a number of its criminal markets by other organized groups, it remains the largest branch of organized crime. Supposedly as many as 1,100 made members and 10,000