ORGANIZED CRIME REGISTRY - NEWSLETTER #3 - 26TH FEB 1998 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- NEWSLETTER CONTENTS: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- MISSION STATEMENT INTRODUCTION BABBLE WHATS NEW/CHANGED THE THIEVES' CODE CRIME NEWS COMING SOON FINISHED ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=MISSION STATEMENT=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- This Newsletter is a supplement to the Organized Crime Registry website. The site is the most comprehensive website on the internet covering the topic of organized crime. Information is presented in a clear, concise format which enables visitors to find what they need quickly and easily. I aim to provide visitors with a valuable guide to help them learn and understand from the work of others more knowlegable than themselves. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=INTRODUCTION=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Hello there, its been a while since the last instalment so a warm welcome to any newcomers and welcome back to the regulars. The new design of the site has been almost completed now, the only section that I haven't done yet is the link pages, time continues to be the problem here so it will probably be a while until they get converted. Other than the conversion stuff Ive been spending what time I have free on promoting the site and trying to get some fresh articles ready, I have a few which will be uploaded very soon I promise. These will be information about the Yakuza, donated from a very knowledgeable source, thanks Mark. I've read them myself and think you will find them very interesting too. Quite a long one this time around so get yourself a coffee and make yourself comfortable... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=BABBLE=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- AMERICAN AND ITALIAN MAFIAS. One thing that is obviously lacking from the site is any amount of information on the American and Italian Mafias. The reason why is totally historical... when I first started the site the idea was just to provide a pointer to organized crime sites, articles etc. on the web. As I started to build a mental picture of the sites available there was un-surprisingly a lot of sites geared towards the American and Italian Mafias. Now without delving into too much detail I concluded that other organized crime areas were possibly lacking more so, hence the deviance to providing more information about other well known crime syndicates. Since this time however the balance needs to be addressed again, this time in favour of adding suitable material covering the American and Italian Mafias. Problem. I've often surfed around on the look out for such material but mostly come up against sensationalist sites containing little or none at all. Not being deterred I persist in my searching knowing one day I will come accross some decent content for inclusion on the site. So if your wondering why the lack of info there's the story - Im working on it so check back soon. EVERYTHING ELSE There are still some weak areas that the site needs to address to continue the battle to be the top organized crime site on the web. Some of the areas that I have plans to address are listed below. If you feel you could contribute in some then please drop me an email and we can take it from there. OK, here's whats missing: Turkish Mafia, Columbian Drug Cartels, Nigerian Frauds and Gangstas/Yardies These and other areas will be addressed in the future so as usual be patient, there's only me building the site and I have a full time job to manage and family to keep happy first! I guess you get the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=WHATS NEW/CHANGED=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- DISCUSSION FORUM Quiet bunch arn't you! Interest in the Forum has been slow to say the least. I was hoping that it would pick up on its own but I guess that was wishful thinking. To be perfectly honest Im not that keen on the host site which looks after the Forum. With this in mind I have setup a new Forum on the Delphi site which looks and feels a lot better so I will changing the link to direct folks to the Delphi incarnation shortly. Who knows the advantage of being on the Delphi site is that the Forum gets more exposure and may even encourage a few people to post a few messages! But seriously its not an easy thing to get going and the subject matter is not the lightest of materials to tackle so I'll see how we get on, I will certanily be refering anybody who contacts me with requests for information to the Forum since they reach a wider audience this way. The advantages of shifting to the Delphi forum are briefly listed here: Looks better, less downtime, faster server, and more exposure. In fact I've just changed the link to go to the new forum now so if you havn't looked check it out now, here's the URL: You will need to provide a password to protect you against spamming etc. but login is straight forward enough and once its done its a simple matter to check out your favourite forum. I understand the login process will be revised soon to make it friendlier too. And in the interest of self-promotion I will be posting copies of this newsletter onto the forum too. ARTICLES Apart from the Russian Mafia articles that I mentioned last time around its been very quiet in this area Im afraid. Like I mentioned in the Intro I have a couple of new articles about the Yakuza to upload which will be done shortly. Apart from that things are a little quiet. None the less there's plenty of topics to be convered in coming the coming months so as a bit of a tease I will list some here: Extorsion, Money Laundering, Fraud (credit card, phone card etc.) These and plenty of other subjects will all find their place on the site as soon as time permits. STOP PRESS I just located a batch of articles at a new site I came across, one of the articles has been uploaded to the Russian section of 'Articles'. In addition, I've uploaded six articles about money laundering too! You can find the articles page here: NEWS DIGEST As you are aware you had to signup for this Newsletter thru GetReminded , well I'm so impressed enough with the service that they provide that I am swithing the News Digest to operate under this service too. I figure that the subscription list is growing weekly so its hassle for me to keep maintaining it. Its a far better service for everyone and it only takes a minute to signup. Besides, less admin time means more time for 'real' development on the site. So with effect from now all News Digests will be sent out via GetReminded. Simplicity! If you want to sign up you can follow this link and follow the instructions: NEWS DIGEST ARCHIVE I dont think I will ever get around to archiving the News Digest posts because after checking a few old ones I discovered a lot of broken links. The reason for this is because most of the news hosts do not archive material which means the links contained in the News Digest do not often work after several weeks. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=THE THIEVES' CODE=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Little bonus now... what follows here is an extract from a Russian Organized Crime article which can be found on the site at: http://members.tripod.com/~orgcrime/ruscali.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The Thieves' Code A thief is bound by the Code to: 1.Forsake his relatives--mother, father, brothers, sisters... 2.Not have a family of his own -- no wife, no children; this does not however, preclude him from having a lover. 3.Never, under any circumstances work, no mafter how much difficulty this brings-,live only on means gleaned from thievery. 4.Help other thieves -- both by moral and material support, utilizing the commune of thieves. 5.Keep secret information about the whereabouts of accomplices (i.e. dens, districts, hideouts, safe apartments, etc.). 6.In unavoidable situations (if a thief is under investigation) to take the blame for someone else's crime; this buys the other person time of freedom. 7.Demand a convocation of inquiry for the purpose of resolving disputes in the event of a conflict between oneself and other thieves, or between thieves. 8.If necessary, participate in such inquiries. 9.Carry out the punishment of the offending thief as decided by the convocation. 10.Not resist carrying out the decision of punishing the offending thief who is found guilty, with punishment determined by the convocation. 11.Have good command of the thieves'jargon ("Fehnay"). 12.Not gamble without being abie to cover losses. 13.Teach the trade to young beginners. 14.Have, if possible, informants from the rank and file of thieves. 15.Not lose your reasoning ability when using alcohol. 16.Have nothing to do with the authorities (particularly with the ITU [Correctional Labor Authority]), not participate in public activities, nor join any community organizations. 17.Not take weapons from the hands of authorities; not serve in the military. 18.Make good on promises given to other thieves. Translated from: Dictionary: Prison, Camp, Blotnoi, Jargon (Speech and Graphic Portraits of Soviet Prisons) Authors-compilers: Dantsik Sergeyevich Baldaev, Vladimir Kuz'mich Belko, and Igor Mikhailovich Isupov. (Occupation of authors unknown.) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=CRIME NEWS=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Here's a brief overview of organized crime related news stories that were reported over the last few weeks: .... Yugoslav Mafia Leader Buried http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Yugoslavia-Mafia-Funeral.html .... Jailed mobsters defy rules, become dads http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/nws11.htm .... Mob war flares again in Naples http://www.msnbc.com/news/145053.asp .... Informant endured mob threat http://www.detnews.com/1998/metro/9802/20/02200099.htm .... Unit to act as industry watchdog http://www.sunherald.com/region/docs/task022098.htm .... Film Star Reported to Have Gang Ties http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/1998/02/18/MN38444.DTL .... 2 admit roles in drug case http://www.phillynews.com/daily_news/98/Feb/14/local/TURR14.htm .... To recieve the complete list of news reports, which is far more comprehensive and includes a brief paragraph from each story, you need to subscribe by following this link: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=COMING SOON=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- An idea that I have been thinking about for some time is starting up a column from guest writers, its only a thought at the moment but I will probably launch this sooner rather than later. I expect the column would be updated on a monthly basis and become kind of like the 'special' for the site for a month. If you would like to contribute to this or have any ideas regarding the feature drop me an email at the usual address. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -=FINISHED=- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- I think thats enough for this time. As usual I'd like to thank everyone for reading and visiting the site. So, until the next issue... Regards to you all, James Graham, Webmaster, Organized Crime Registry An archive of this and previous issues can be found here: (c) Copyright 1998 James Graham This newsletter may be redistributed by email only in its unedited form.