With the assistance of Eurojust and Europol, the judicial and law enforcement authorities in Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands collaborated to dismantle a drug trafficking network primarily composed of Albanian nationals. During a joint action, 35 suspects were arrested and 51 apartments and premises were searched in the countries involved. More than 600 police officers participated in the operation, in which Eurojust assisted the different authorities in setting up and financing a joint investigation team on the case.

The criminal network is believed to be responsible for the extensive trafficking of cocaine and cannabis from South America to Europe, as well as its subsequent distribution throughout the European Union. It is also known for the use of violence, including episodes of torture and kidnapping for extortion.

The criminals were able to draw on significant economic resources allegedly obtained from previous drug trafficking activities. The network operated multiple logistical bases where they stored the illicit substances and the proceeds from their criminal activities, providing meeting locations for the members of the group. They also owned a large fleet of vehicles equipped with sophisticated hidden compartments, cell phones with encrypted text messaging applications and other utilities.

Based on the investigation findings, the criminal network carried out at least 36 imports totalling a tonne of cocaine and a tonne of hashish between the months of March 2020 and June 2021. These substances would have generated more than 1 billion euros in the distribution market. Over 1 million euros in cash was also seized during the investigation.

The proceeds of the crime were divided among the network members based on their individual responsibilities. In Germany, some suspects owned a luxury restaurant, a bar and a real estate agency that were allegedly used to launder drug money.

The case was opened at Eurojust in September 2021 at the request of the German authorities. In July 2022, a coordination strategy was set up between German and Italian authorities with the support of Eurojust. The Agency organised two coordination meetings to facilitate judicial cooperation and prepare its joint action day.

The European Serious and Organised Crime Centre has been actively assisting the case since late 2020. During this period, it has exchanged over 250 secure messages with the relevant authorities involved. Extensive analytical support enabled the identification of key targets and mapping of their criminal activities around the world. Europol organised several operational meetings, both at its headquarters in The Hague and abroad. In addition, two Europol officers were on the ground in Germany and Italy during the action day to support the authorities with their investigative measures.

During the day of action, a secure communication platform was also set up by Europol to enable the exchange of tactical information in real time between the various police authorities involved.

The research and organisation of the joint action day was supported by the @ON Network, funded by the European Union (Internal Security Fund Project ISF4@ON) and led by the Italian Antimafia Investigation Directorate (DIA).

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As reported in June by Policing Insight, the website specialising in the field of security, University of Waterloo doctoral student Tandeep Sidhu reveals that Canadian society’s trust in its police is steadily declining.

One of the main causes according to the researcher is the persistent militarisation of the police. For example, police tactical response unit vehicles using the latest high-tech equipment share all sorts of similarities with military vehicles.

Along these lines, several police investigators find the increasing use of these tactical units in incidents that are considered routine or commonplace to be disproportionate. An example would be the use of these teams in incidents involving people with mental health problems. In late 2020, a retired Mississauga resident was shot and killed by police during a mental health crisis. The intervention was carried out by the Peel Regional Police Tactical and Rescue Unit.

It is worth mentioning that the interactions between tactical units and citizens often end up in violent confrontations. These teams base their actions on military-style weapons, such as assault rifles, stun grenades, battering rams and other specialised equipment similar to that used by the military.

According to Sidhu’s research, Toronto’s Emergency Task Force (EFT) began adopting equipment very similar to Canadian Armed Forces infantry and U.S. Special Forces troops in 2016. The author finds it worrying that law enforcement, which should be guarantors of the preservation of people’s rights and lives, adopt attitudes and equipment belonging to units specialised in fighting wars.

This increased militarisation means that police units are using more and more military technology and tactics on the civilian population. Tactical police units are often involved in raids at night or in the early hours of the morning, when family members or children are also at home.

Tandeep Sidhu believes that the trauma caused by the actions of these police units in cases of mistaken residences or encounters with people who are not involved in criminal activities cannot be underestimated. Some citizens interviewed by the doctoral candidate report having suffered from nightmares, insomnia, or being in a state of constant hypervigilance.

Equipping the police as if they were military units tasked with fighting wars undermines public confidence in the police, mars the very communities the police purport to serve, and moves away from community-based policing models.

By adopting military technology and tactics, the police treat cities and communities as if they were war scenes and civilians as enemies. The implicit message of this militarised equipment is that the civilian population is a threat and war tactics are needed to respond.

Like other police practices, the use of tactical units disproportionately affects racialised people, those living with mental illness, and those from economically marginalised communities.

Tactical officers have also been deployed in response to Indigenous movements over land rights. This illustrates the police’s extensive dependence on heavily militarised reactions across various situations beyond criminal incidents.

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Reports documenting citizens killed after police contact often include cases of individuals being restrained, but for anyone suffering from Acute Behavioural Disturbance (ABD), this approach can prove fatal.

Former Kent Police Sergeant Darren Moor describes in Policinginsight the key indicators of ABD and the steps that officers can take to ensure that medical support is available to the individual and what to do if police restraint is unavoidable.

Approximately 10% of cases of ABD, also known as ‘excited delirium’, result in sudden death, and the officer involved in this situation is likely to spend the next few years of their life reviewing their actions with the coroner in response to this tragedy.

ABD usually develops from chronic drug use or severe mental illness. The police officer may be sent to an incident of someone acting strangely. It could be described as an aggressive or violent individual, perhaps showing extreme agitation and physical exertion or, at the other end of the scale, simply being erratic.

Being naked, along with being warm to the touch and profuse sweating, are classic signs of ABD. Other indicators, according to the School of Emergency Medicine, would include:

• Extremely aggressive or violent behaviour.
• Excessive force and continuing to fight despite restraint.
• Insensitivity to pain.
• Acute psychosis, with fear of imminent death.
• Constant physical activity, with no sign of fatigue.
• Abnormally rapid breathing.
• Heart rate greater than 100 beats per minute.
• Hyperthermia – overheating (this is why they take off their clothes).

With ABD, the person’s heart rate is much faster than it should be, so much so that they are at risk of death if not treated as a medical emergency, and this is the main message the author of this study wants to convey.

As soon as an officer is suspected of being sent to an ABD incident, and this suspicion may arise simply from sensing that someone is naked and erratic, it should be declared via radio as such and explained to the operator that this is a medical emergency, where it is possible that the doctor may need to give tranquillisers before they could go into cardiac arrest, so an ambulance may also be needed to assist with informed care on what to expect.

The aim of the responding officers during this stage is to buy time until medical assistance arrives. The aim is to orchestrate it so that there is no practical police intervention until there is someone with the right skills and who is available to deal with the medical aspect, should it all go wrong. And there is a good chance it could all go wrong.

In the author’s experience, some ambulance professionals and operators are unfamiliar with ABD. They may feel that what the police are asking them to attend to is a much smaller incident than it really is.

The police control room operator may also be unfamiliar with the problem, and this is where one of those communication gap scenarios develops that can lead to tragedy.

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How is the relationship between Police Scotland and the LGBTQI+ community? The report answering this question is part of a study that was funded by the Scottish Institute for Policing Research (SIPR) as part of the Seldom Heard Voices project designed to provide care for often discriminated communities. These “seldom-heard voices” refer to groups or communities that may be less likely to engage with police for various reasons, such as race, religion, sexuality, disability, or age. In the case of this study, the authors were interested in youth identifying within the LGBTQI+ community and with the additional intersectional criteria of having care experience.

The study adopted a critical-interrogative approach that sought to examine the issue of policing in relation to seldom-heard voices through three avenues of inquiry. The first analysed the overall strategic approach of Police Scotland in terms of policing within various communities. This is a key document for publicly communicating Police Scotland’s overall strategic intent for community-based policing. Therefore, the way in which the report is rhetorically constructed is important to convey the commitment to engage with different sectors of society.

The second research modality was to examine material from police recruit training lessons on the topic of dealing with diverse groups. The objective of the SIPR was to ascertain the nature of what is studied during recruit training and to explore the underlying basis of what is taught in terms of prevailing concepts and ideologies.

The third avenue of the research was to explore what young people say about their experience of coming into contact with police officers. The aim was to establish whether the strategic direction of the Police Scotland’s approach to community policing and the training given to recruits to engage with various groups was reflected in young people, some of whom identified as belonging to the LGBTQI+ community.

The study concludes with a series of recommendations, in which it calls for the overall strategic direction of the police in terms of contact with various groups to be explicitly based on a model of new public governance that recognises and promotes modern policing for the public good. This could entail continuing professional development training based on real-life contexts and associated understanding of the changing nature of society and the role of modern policing.

SIPR recommends that Police Scotland’s approach to police recruit training on inclusion and diversity should focus on real-life hate crime, with respect to types of abuse directed at particular groups. This could involve experienced officers sharing with recruits in training cases on how to deal with these crimes and the difficulties involved in charging offenders.

They also recommend that the approach to policing LGBTQI+ youth should recognise their distrust of police officers regarding boundary issues in interventions. This could involve the adoption of empathetic policing as a viable solution to this problem through further research into how police officers can successfully work with youth to create a safer and more tolerant society.

Finally, they recommend that police officers recognise intersectionality in dealing with diverse groups, especially those with experience in care. A demonstration of this recognition would be to act as a role model by declaring that the care experience is a protected characteristic when it comes to policing in Scotland.

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Last February, independent police consultant Nick Gargan presented a study at a conference organised by Cityforum, a policy advisory and strategic development organisation. In this area, the UK’s leading police chiefs, suppliers and academics met and exchanged ideas on transforming the public contact of the police. Gargan reflected on key issues in the police public service, how to address public expectations, the increasing shift to digital channels, options for improvement in service delivery, and the fact that the entire police-public contact system is under great pressure.

Previously, police forces in the UK used to gear up for a spectacular night with an extraordinary demand for services once a year, with some 100,000 calls on New Year’s Eve alone. Now, for many forces, this extraordinary demand is a standard, sometimes daily, reality.

Each police force has its own story to tell, but the overall pattern shows public contact demand, which is 20-25% above pre-pandemic levels. And it is increasing by approximately 7% per year. Something is definitely off-balance.

Of the 350 individual rating judgements that have been issued, 30% rated the performance of the police force as “needing improvement” or simply “inadequate”. Less than half were better than adequate.

And the most problematic performance area of all? “Response to the public”. The first stage of most citizens’ contact with the police is likely to be the weakest and least satisfactory.

These challenges occur despite efforts to keep the system up and running. There have been successive waves of reforms and innovations regarding police contact management. But there is a difference between heroically facing an unwinnable challenge and winning. “Polishing the problem” no longer works.

The United Kingdom recorded more than 35 million emergencies in 2022. And the number continues to grow. Violent crime is on the rise: sex crimes increased by one third in 2022 and homicides by one quarter.

New types of emergencies are occurring; forest fires, hurricanes and floods have led to an eight-fold increase in natural disasters over the past 40 years. Medical emergencies are also on the rise: there were more than 16 million visits to Accident & Emergency departments in 2022. And population changes will continue to fuel demand: by 2050 the UK’s over-65 population will have increased by 25%.

Having officers come to the street to answer the phones may be unpleasant, but it is also unavoidable if there is a 37% vacancy rate. Increasing staff attrition rates only serves to exacerbate the challenge.

In the face of this rapid increase in current and future demand are resourcing challenges. Even recruiting at current establishment levels would undoubtedly be insufficient, but many forces struggle to manage it in the current lobar climate, especially in the south-east of the country.

Fewer staff are asked to deal with increasingly complex demand and to manage the deployments of a less experienced workforce using technology that, in many places, is in dire need of modernisation.

Short-term measures are needed to fill hiring gaps and even increase the workforce, but ultimately it is likely to be as futile as building more lanes on the M25 motorway: it may look like you are doing something purposeful but, in reality, that is unlikely. The problem needs to be solved.

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Thirty-five coordinated simultaneous house searches were carried out in Serbia and the Netherlands in early May 2023, targeting both the leaders of the cartel and the drug distribution infrastructure. Seven other members of this criminal organisation had been arrested in Belgium in 2021. Two people were previously arrested for other crimes in Serbia and Peru, while another suspect was arrested in the Netherlands on 8th May of this year.

In total, 23 people have been arrested in this international police operation, including the three leaders of the criminal organisation, considered by Europol as high-value targets.

As a result of the searches, a significant amount of incriminating material was seized, such as: 15 high-end cars, jewellery and luxury watches worth an estimated 2 million euros and almost 3 million euros in cash, weapons and explosives, including 2 sniper rifles, 3 automatic rifles, guns, silencers, 24 detonator capsules and 5 devices for remote initiation of detonators, 13 packs of plastic explosives and several hundred rounds of ammunition.

This cross-border operation is the result of intelligence development within the framework of the Europol operational task force investigating the use of the Sky ECC encrypted communication platform, which has been removed since March 2021.

Serbia was able to identify key targets on its territory and trace their criminal activities worldwide, in cooperation with France, Belgium and the Netherlands, and with the support of Europol’s Drugs Unit.

This criminal organisation is believed to be behind shipments of several tonnes of cocaine that arrived in Europe directly from Colombia, Brazil and Ecuador, or by transiting through logistical infrastructures in West Africa.

This criminal gang was known in the criminal realm for its extreme violence and for its constant involvement in high-end robberies. One of the targets arrested in Serbia was a former leader of the notorious Pink Panther criminal group.

Thanks to the analysis of Sky ECC data, at least seven tonnes of cocaine seized at European ports in 2020 were linked to this cartel, including: 700 kilos of cocaine seized in Rotterdam, Netherlands; 1.2 tonnes of cocaine seized in Hasselt, Belgium; and 5 tonnes of cocaine seized in Aruba, Netherlands Antilles.

The crime bosses, arrested in Belgrade as part of this operation, were the largest cocaine traffickers in the Western Balkans identified as part of ongoing analysis work conducted on Sky ECC data.

The recent removal of three encrypted communication tools used by criminals, such as Encrochat, Sky ECC and Anom, showed the prevalence of Balkan criminals in the global cocaine trade and organised crime activities.

To respond to this threat, Europol created the operational task force called the ‘Balkan Cartel’ and brought together countries in Europe and around the world to effectively attack this threat originating from this region. This action day will be the result of this operational task force.

In addition, Europol has been provided with continuous analysis and development in the field of intelligence to support field researchers. Two Europol staff members were also dispatched to Belgrade to support the Serbian authorities with their investigative measures during this day of action.

Eurojust enabled judicial cooperation between the countries involved in the investigation.

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Increasing demands for police services to respond to people in mental health crisis in Canada are causing significant burdens on already inadequate police resources.

With the obvious worsening of community mental health, accelerated as a result of the COVID-19 epidemic, governments have unwittingly tasked police services with a job they should not be doing.

This has meant that the police are increasingly being called upon to provide interventions in what is essentially mental health care. The police have thus become responsible for addressing challenges that police forces are ill-equipped to deal with. It also means that resources in traditional police work such as investigating organised crime, ensuring public safety, etc. are decreasing.

The Canadian healthcare system has been unable to meet this growing demand for mental health care. The country’s collective response has failed to build sufficient capacity to manage the risks and cope with this demand.

In the case of the police in England and Wales, they report that between 20 and 40% of police work time is being spent dealing with mental health-related calls and incidents.

Moreover, some experts say that, in the case of those who argue that police forces would simply need to better train frontline officers to optimally manage this challenge, the stark reality is that this would be a poor use of police resources. So, what they propose as the correct response to the problem is to provide trained mental health professionals with in-depth knowledge and experience, dedicated to these diseases and in a position to deliver and manage mental health crises from the frontline.

Thus, the police reform being proposed in Canada to address this systemic problem is putting officers in this support role, rather than asking them to lead a wide range of complex challenges around mental health. As a basic principle this reform would endeavour to make Canadian society a safer and healthier society.

Callers for change in this area add that if what is desired is effective policing, making society a safer place to live and work, it would be critical to identify and address the challenges facing modern policing. And to find an effective response to the growing problem of mental health, the important thing would not be to better train the police; while this is an admirable goal and could provide some benefits, we cannot forget the excessive workloads and lack of resources that have been dragging on for some time.

Policy makers should address the problem by investing in training in frontline mental health intervention, increasing the number of professionals and increasing the capacity to act of those who work in the health system.

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Public opinion in Brazil was shaken in early May this year by alleged new cases of police violence, with allegations of torture in the case of bodies found after a police operation in a favela and, above all, in the case of a man who died of asphyxiation inside the boot of an official police vehicle in the town of Umbauba. The Federal Highway Police (PRF) claimed that the agents used immobilisation techniques and weapons of low offensive potential in the face of the detainee’s strong aggressiveness at a police checkpoint.

The shootout in the favelas of the Complexo do Alemão on 4th May was so intense that the elite squad of the Rio de Janeiro Military Police ran out of ammunition in just two hours. It is noteworthy that the final result of the operation was 18 people dead.

According to police, the operation, which involved some 400 uniformed personnel, targeted a group of individuals suspected of car and bank robberies as well as attacks on police stations. Among the deceased were two women, some fifteen suspects and a policeman.

But various security experts, relatives of the victims and residents of the area questioned the police action as they considered it to be extremely violent. For example, one of the dead women was shot while driving her vehicle down a nearby avenue. The other died while police were removing barricades in the area, although uniformed officers deny that the projectile came from their weapons.

Called a “massacre” by many elected officials and community activists, the police raid has turned out to be the second deadliest in Rio’s history in a favela.

As a result of the events, the human rights organisation Human Rights Watch also expressed its dismay in a public statement. It is worth mentioning that Brazil has one of the police forces with the most fatalities in police custody and with the most police officers killed in the line of duty in the world. For example, in 2021 there were 6,100 fatalities in police operations, while 183 law enforcement officers were killed, according to the Violence Monitor project.

What is true is that this police operation has been the one that has generated the strongest public reactions in Rio de Janeiro, as explained by Geni, a study group on public security and violence at the Fluminense Federal University (UFF). And it is this foundation that believes that police operations lack effectiveness, are often motivated by a thirst for revenge and revel in total impunity.

In addition, there were two other police operations in the last 14 months that resulted in even more deaths. One police operation was in the favela of Jacarezinho in May 2021 – the deadliest in Rio de Janeiro, with 28 fatalities – and the second, in Vila Cruzeiro in May 2023, with 23 deaths.

The Rio police force assures that these actions are based on intelligence reports and are carried out in accordance with the law, justice and technical operational protocols.

But the reality is that the increase in street violence and the growing militarisation of public security operations are contributing to a very confusing situation. The convoluted institutional role of the Military Police and the increasingly important role of the Army demonstrate that, unlike what happens in developed countries, in Brazil the duties of national defence are dangerously mixed with those of maintaining domestic order.

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132 members of one of the world’s most powerful criminal networks have been arrested during a collaborative day of action carried out by 10 countries. Early on 3 May, police authorities in Belgium, Germany, Italy, France, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Romania, Brazil and Panama raided a number of locations and seized several companies. More than 2,770 agents were on the ground during the massive operation.

Eurojust and Europol supported this international operation against the ‘Ndrangheta, which has become the biggest success involving the Italian crime syndicate to date. The mafia organisation is responsible for much of the cocaine trade in Europe, combined with systematic money laundering, bribery and violence.

The criminal network under investigation was led by several powerful ‘Ndrangheta families based mainly in the Italian province of Reggio Calabria, in the city of San Luca, more precisely. Some of these families have been involved in decades-long clan violence known as the ‘San Luca feud’, which has led to mass shootings in Italy and abroad such as, for example, the 2007 Duisburg massacre in Germany.

In addition to being members of a mafia organisation, some of the criminal network’s members were also behind criminal conspiracies involving drug trafficking, illegal possession of firearms, trafficking illegally obtained firearms, money laundering, fraudulent asset registration, tax fraud, and tax evasion, as well as aiding and abetting fugitives (who have since been detained). Two of these fugitives had been on the European Union’s most wanted list.

The Italian criminal network mainly engaged in international drug trafficking from South America to Europe, as well as to Australia. Authorities discovered that the network was working in collaboration with the Colombian organised crime group Gulf Clan and an Albanian-speaking criminal group operating in Ecuador and several European countries.

In addition, ‘Ndrangheta clans were involved in international firearms trafficking from Pakistan to South America, providing equipment to the notorious criminal group PCC (Primeiro Comando da Capital) in exchange for cocaine shipments. Investigators tracked the flow of money in an extensive global money laundering scheme, with massive investments in Belgium, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil.

The criminal group was investing profits in real estate, restaurants, hotels, car washes, supermarkets and other commercial activities. The criminals often relied on facilitators who used the hawala system to pay for cocaine or transfer illicit assets.

Eurojust supported the police authorities involved by setting up and financing two joint investigation teams. The agency also hosted ten coordination meetings after setting up a centre to enable rapid cooperation between the judicial authorities involved in the day of action. Three cases linked to Eurojust were opened at the request of Italian, German and Belgian authorities. Eurojust also facilitated the transmission and execution of European investigation orders.

Europol’s Italian organised crime analysis project supported the investigation as a priority case and provided cross-matching reports to the national research units involved. In total, more than 200 SIENA messages were exchanged between involved parties. In addition to supporting the investigation itself, the analysis project also supported the investigation of the three fugitives.

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The latest data released by Canada’s Tracking (In)Justice project suggests that the average annual number of police-involved deaths between 2011 and 2022 increased by two-thirds compared to the average annual figure for the previous decade. Project members Andrew Crosby, Alexander McClelland and Tanya L. Sharpe believe that this increase, along with the racial disparity and jurisdictional variations in these numbers, support the need to call for greater accountability, transparency and scrutiny of police conduct in Canada.

According to the authors of the project, it is clear that fatal encounters with police are increasing year after year in Canada. The number of civilians killed in incidents with police where force was used has steadily been increasing since 2000. This is leaving families and communities with little support or resources to hold them accountable.

But one of the main problems is that there is no Canadian or foreign agency or institution working on, for example, an up-to-date, centralised data set or a mechanism to track fatalities and provide information on the victim, the location, the police service involved, the type of force used and many other contextual details.

This is carried out solely by members of the Tracking (In)Justice project, which documents and analyses police-involved deaths where force was used in Canada. Tracking (In)Justice is a partnership between academics and advocates who aim to shed light on police violence to help inform demands for accountability, transparency and change in policing institutions.

Collecting this information provides the possibility to ask new questions, such as why some police forces have more frequent deaths under their belt than others.

There have long been calls for police and governments to collect and share data on incidents in which the use of force results in civilian injuries and deaths. Journalists, academics, civil society groups and victims’ families have been engaged in this work for a long time now.

Preliminary findings indicate that incidents involving the use of force are on the rise, with the highest number being from 2022. Part of this long-term trend may be due to increased access to information about police-involved killings and deaths. But access to information alone does not explain the remarkable increase in recent years.

According to data from Tracking (In)Justice, there was an average of 22.7 police-involved deaths per year between 2000 and 2010. In comparison, an average of 37.8 people died each year between 2011 and 2022. This represents a 66.5% increase.

Gunshot deaths also seem to be occurring more frequently. Tracking (In)Justice documented 704 involving the use of police force deaths in Canada between 2000 and 2022.

The data include deaths from police shootings, as well as deaths involving other types of police weapons (e.g. Tasers) or physical intervention.

These data were collected by using publicly available information from the media and official reports. The data contains information related to the victim, including name, age and race (if available). The location of the death, the police involved and the highest level of force used are also documented.

According to long-standing patterns of inequality, there are significant racial disparities in the overall increase in police-involved fatalities when force is used.

Black and indigenous people represent about 10% of the population in Canada, but account for 27.2% of police-involved shooting deaths when the victim’s race is identified.

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