All publications

7 Nov 2025

Social Embeddedness, Multiplexity, and Criminal Collaboration Within the Sinaloa Cartel

This study examines how social embeddedness and multiplex social ties shape criminal collaboration in the Sinaloa Cartel. It investigates how different types of relationships—such as kinship, friendship, meetings, and compadre ties—influence participation in drug crimes and broader forms of collaboration.

22 Jul 2025

Waste crime investigation phases and the role of emerging technologies

EMERITUS Research in Brief - A Crime&tech project

19 May 2025

Criminal infiltration in the economy

This volume collects the proceedings of the conference “The Dynamics of Criminal Infiltration into the Economy: Risks and Remedies” (March 21, 2024, Milan – more information available here), organised by Transcrime – Joint Research Centre on Innovation and Crime of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore –…

14 Apr 2025

High-level Corruption: an Analysis of Schemes, Costs and Policy Recommendations

FALCON Project Policy Brief

12 Feb 2025

Online radicalisation, extremism, and terrorism

Key results from the research conducted under the project ALLIES

3 Feb 2025

Bricks or cooks? Geographical and social determinants of the investment choices of mafia-type organized crime

This article studies legitimate businesses confiscated from mafia groups in Italy to assess whether mafia investment patterns across industries depend on the characteristics of the geographical environment in which infiltrated firms operate. We carry out a spatial regression analysis of more than 1700 firms, with special emphasis on restaurants/hotels and…

1 Mar 2024

The resilience of drug trafficking organizations: Simulating the impact of police arresting key roles

This research analyses the resistance and resilience of drug trafficking organizations against law enforcement interventions targeting specific operational roles.

2 Jun 2023

Inductive and transductive link prediction for criminal network analysis

The identification of potential offenders, who are more likely to form a new group and co-offend in a crime, plays an essential role in narrowing down law enforcement investigations and improving predictive policing. Once a crime is committed, focusing on linking it to previously reported crimes…

11 Feb 2022

Organized Crime Groups

A Systematic Review of Individual-Level Risk Factors Related to Recruitment…

13 Sep 2021

COVID-19 and Organized Crime

Strategies employed by criminal groups to increase their profits and power in the first months of the pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic has created new opportunities for organized criminal groups and confronted them with new challenges. Analysis of how these groups have reacted to the pandemic yields better understanding of how…