169 articles
Clerkenwell crime syndicate
The Clerkenwell crime syndicate, also called the Adams Family or A-Team, is an alleged London organised crime group based in Islington and Clerkenwell, led by brothers Terry, Patsy and Tommy Adams, active from the 1980s in extortion, armed robbery, drug trafficking, and money laundering.
Cleveland crime family
The Cleveland crime family, also called the Porrello crime family or Cleveland mafia, is an American Mafia organization based in Cleveland, Ohio, arising from the Mayfield Road Mob.
Colombo crime family
The Colombo crime family, originally the Profaci family, is one of New York's five Mafia families, founded by Joseph Profaci, renamed under boss Joe Colombo in 1963, marked by three internal wars, and led for decades by imprisoned Carmine Persico.
Comando Vermelho
Comando Vermelho (Red Command, CV), Brazil's oldest criminal organization, founded in 1979 in the Ilha Grande Cândido Mendes prison through contact between common and political prisoners; based in Rio de Janeiro, with about 30,000 members, network structure, and rivalry with the PCC.
Consigliere
Consigliere (Italian "counselor") is the senior advisor rank in the Italian-American and Sicilian Mafia, part of a family's administration with the boss and underboss, typically the number-three man, mediator, and keeper of rules and traditions.
Crips
The Crips are a loose association of mostly African American street gangs founded in Los Angeles in the late 1960s, best known for their rivalry with the Bloods.
D-Company
D-Company (D Company, D-Gang) is the transnational crime syndicate founded by Dawood Ibrahim in 1970s Mumbai, now based in Pakistan, known for narcotics, extortion, the 1993 Bombay bombings, ISI ties, and U.S. Kingpin Act sanctions.
Dead Rabbits
Dead Rabbits: name given to an Irish Five Points street-fighting group of 1850s New York, rivals of the Bowery Boys, famous for the July 1857 riot; historians dispute whether the gang existed under that name.
DeCavalcante crime family
DeCavalcante crime family, also called the New Jersey family or 'Real Sopranos': an Elizabeth/Newark-based La Cosa Nostra family, the only indigenous New Jersey Mafia family, built on construction union rackets under Simone 'Sam the Plumber' DeCavalcante and John Riggi.
Detroit Partnership
The Detroit Partnership is Detroit, Michigan's Italian-American La Cosa Nostra family, also called the Tocco–Zerilli crime family after its intermarried ruling families; known for Prohibition-era Purple Gang roots, gambling and extortion rackets, and the 1996 GAMTAX indictment of 17 members including boss Jack Tocco.
Dixie Mafia
Dixie Mafia: a loose confederation of white Southern criminals active from the 1960s, based in Biloxi, Mississippi, with no formal hierarchy or ties to La Cosa Nostra; known for Gulf Coast corruption and the 1987 Sherry murders.
Drug cartel
Drug cartel: term coined in the 1980s for Colombia's Medellín and Cali syndicates, now applied chiefly to Mexican DTOs such as Sinaloa and CJNG; large criminal organizations trafficking cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and marijuana.
Drug lord
Drug lord (also kingpin): leader of a drug trafficking organization controlling production, smuggling, distribution, and finances. Examples include El Chapo and El Mencho; the DEA's kingpin strategy targets them, with evidence of violence increases after captures.
Enedina Arellano Félix
Enedina Arellano Félix, also known as Enedina Arellano Félix de Toledo or La Jefa, born 1961 in Sinaloa, is the sister of the Tijuana Cartel founders, reportedly its financial operator from 2006 and leader from 2008, and an OFAC-sanctioned individual.
Five Families
The Five Families are New York City's major Italian-American Mafia organizations: Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese, formed after the 1930–31 Castellammarese War under Lucky Luciano's Commission. Once controlling rackets citywide, they remain active in gambling and labor racketeering despite RICO-era prosecutions.
Five Points Gang
Five Points Gang: late-1890s New York street gang founded by Paul Kelly (Paolo Antonio Vaccarelli) in the Five Points slum, heir to the Dead Rabbits and Bowery Boys, tied to Tammany-era voter fraud.
French Connection
The French Connection, also called La French, was a Corsican-run heroin trafficking network based in Marseille that supplied the United States until the early 1970s.
Gambino crime family
The Gambino crime family is one of New York's five La Cosa Nostra families, formed in 1931 from the Mangano family, named for boss Carlo Gambino, and led later by John Gotti; known for gambling, loansharking, labor racketeering, and construction extortion.
Gang
Gang: a durable association of three or more people with shared identity, symbols, and elevated criminal activity, usually meaning US street gangs; loosely structured, distinct from organized crime, historically tied to immigration and migration waves.
Gangs in Australia
Gangs in Australia covers outlaw motorcycle gangs (bikies), other organised crime groups, and youth gangs; roughly 5,669 known OMCG members in 39 gangs, with anti-association laws and police strategies shaping state responses.
Gangs in Canada
Gangs in Canada cover street gangs, outlaw motorcycle gangs, and mafia groups; no single definition exists. About 4% of firearm-related violent crime was gang-related in 2024, and gang homicides fell to 119 in 2025.
Gangs in Chicago
Gangs in Chicago: street groups from antebellum fire-company gangs to Irish outfits like the Dukies, mid-century Blackstone Rangers, Vice Lords, Latin Kings, and Gangster Disciples, then post-1990s cliques, with policing, gang database scrutiny, and prevention programs.
Gangs in New Zealand
Gangs in New Zealand, notably the Mongrel Mob, Black Power, King Cobras and Hell's Angels, are post-war organised groups, largely Māori and Pacific, now regulated under the 2024 gang insignia ban.
Gangs in the United States
Gangs in the United States: durable, street-oriented, criminally active youth groups with no single accepted definition; traced to about 1783 on the East Coast, measured at 1.4 million members in 33,000 gangs (2011), countered by the OJJDP Comprehensive Gang Model and focused deterrence.
Gangster
A gangster (also mobster) is a member of an organized group of violent criminals. Distinguished from ordinary gang members by membership in continuing criminal enterprises such as mafias, triads, and yakuza.
Gangster Disciples
The Gangster Disciples, also called the Black Gangster Disciples, are an African-American street gang founded in Chicago in the mid-1960s by Larry Hoover and David Barksdale.
Genovese crime family
The Genovese crime family is one of New York's Five Families of La Cosa Nostra, founded as the Luciano family and renamed for Vito Genovese in 1957; known for secrecy, labor racketeering, and relative freedom from informants.
Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela
Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela (El Ajedrecista), with brother Miguel, led Colombia's Cali Cartel, which trafficked about 80% of world cocaine by the early 1990s; arrested 1995, extradited 2004, pled guilty 2006, sentenced 30 years, died in U.S. prison 2022.
Greek mafia (Ελληνική μαφία)
Greek mafia (Ελληνική μαφία) is the media term for Greece's domestic organized crime groups: drug trafficking, extortion, fuel and tobacco smuggling, and over 20 contract killings since 2017, including the 2025 murder of Giorgos Moschouris.
Guadalajara Cartel
Guadalajara Cartel (Cártel de Guadalajara), a Mexican drug trafficking organization of the early 1980s founded by Félix Gallardo, Caro Quintero, and Fonseca Carrillo; precursor of the Sinaloa, Tijuana, and Juárez cartels; linked to DEA agent Camarena's 1985 murder.