Tackling transnational crime

Published date01 June 2018
AuthorW. James Wolffe QC
DOI10.1177/2032284418767015
Date01 June 2018
Subject MatterAnalysis and Opinion
Analysis and Opinion
Tackling transnational crime:
A Scottish perspective
Rt. Hon. W. James Wolffe QC, The Lord Advocate
Scottish Government
Abstract
In this speech, given in Brussels on 29 January 2018, the Lord Advocate, James Wolffe QC, the
head of Scotland’s systems of prosecution and investigation of deaths, discusses, from a Scottish
perspective, the challenge of transnational crime and the benefits of current European Union (EU)
cooperation regimes in the prosecution of cross-border crime, in the context of the United
Kingdom’s intention to withdraw from the EU.
Keywords
Transnational crime, EU cooperation, prosecution, Lord Advocate, Crown Office and Procurator
Fiscal Service, Scottish Government
Introduction
In January this year, the Scottish courts imposed lengthy prison sentences on nine men who are
members of a significant organized crime group.
The operation of the group centred on the importation of very substantial quantities of cocaine
and its wholesale to other organized crime groups in the United Kingdom. In that regard, they are at
the top of the chain of supply in Scotland and the United Kingdom as a whole. The group has also
trafficked firearms to enforce by violence its own operations and for onward supply to its client
crime groups.
Police searches at a number of premises in Scotland uncovered, among other things, a signif-
icant cache of firearms, including automatic weapons, sophisticated anti-surveillance equipment
and over £1.6 million in cash. Among the specific offences dealt with last week were abduction,
assault and the discharge of firearms, as well as involvement in serious organized crime.
This case is just one illustration of the nature of the challenge which law enforcement agencies
face today, both nationally and internationally; and it illustrates too the connection, in the context
of serious organized crime, between domestic criminality and transnational crime.
Corresponding author:
Rt. Hon. W. James Wolffe QC, The Lord Advocate, 25 Chambers Street, Edinburgh, UK.
E-mail: lordadvocate@gov.scot
New Journal of European Criminal Law
2018, Vol. 9(2) 173–181
ªThe Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/2032284418767015
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