The Yakuza and the Way of the Would-Be Warrior
Ian Buruma on “Yakuza: A 400-Year History of the Japanese Underworld,” by Andrew Rankin.
crime
The Cellmate Who Taught Me the Codes of Russian Prison
In an excerpt from his book “This Cursed Beautiful Land,” Evan Gershkovich, a foreign correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, writes about his experience in Moscow’s Lefortovo prison.
Why We Can’t Get Enough Juicy Art Heist Stories
The books and movies—Ocean's 8, The Mastermind, Topkapi, How to Steal a Million, Inside, Artifact—all offer mixed messages.
The Forgery Market
There is a place where you can custom order forgeries of nearly any official document you desire. It’s cheap, fast and, of course, illegal.
How Neuroscience Is Shaking the Foundation of Our Legal System | TheCollector
Can brain scans predict criminal intent? We examine the tense collision between modern neuroscience and the age-old foundations of our justice system.
The Witness – Texas Monthly
For more than a decade, Michelle Lyons’s job required her to watch condemned criminals be put to death. After 278 executions, she won't ever be the same.
How Soviet prisons spread a secret 'language of thieves' now spoken by millions
The tricks of the jail jargon Fenya were once used to bewilder guards in Stalin's Gulags. Now they are now being used by Russian cyber-criminals.
‘The devil’s child’: the rise and fall of the only female yakuza
The long read: Mako Nishimura fought her way into the Japanese underworld, but drug addiction and the slow demise of organised crime gangs almost destroyed her
Meet the Dutch art detective who tracks down stolen masterpieces
For 20 years, Dutch art detective Arthur Brand has acted as an intermediary between the police and people who know where stolen artwork might be hiding. He says patience and trust are everything.
George Bell Served 24 Years in Prison for a Crime He Didn’t Commit. Now He’s Learning to Live Again.
After a quarter century behind bars, he was exonerated for the 1996 crime and received the largest payout ever from New York City. But money can’t buy back all that time.
Art Detective Arthur Brand Is Like Indiana Jones but With a More Elegant Wardrobe
Mysterious late-night visits, an undercover hunt for Hitler's horses, and a Picasso on the couch are business as usual for the Dutch sleuth.
Inside the Texas Crime Lab That’s Cracked Hundreds of Cold Cases
"The killing of Catherine Edwards, in Beaumont, long remained unsolved. Then came Othram, a start-up whose breakthroughs in DNA technology are helping identify bodies and solve decades-old murders and rapes."
In and Out at the FSB: A Window into the Moscow Life of Wirecard's Jan Marsalek
German police have been searching for years for Jan Marsalek, who is suspected of having embezzled billions of euros through Wirecard and thought to be working as an agent for the Russian intelligence agency FSB. DER SPIEGEL tracked him down in Moscow.
Who Killed the Fudge King?
How I (possibly) solved a cold case on my summer vacation.
My Uncle, the Hit Man
No one in my family wanted to talk about Harold’s life as a contract killer for the Mob. Then one day he called me.
The Haunted Juror
In 1987, two innocent teen-agers went to prison for murder. Thirty-seven years later, a juror learned she got it wrong.
To Live and Die in Dallas: A Year Inside the City’s Homicide Unit
The city’s homicide unit granted a year of unprecedented access to photographer Richard Sharum. His pictures tell a vivid story of cops, criminals, and victims—and the violent act that binds them together.
Why the world’s best vanilla is so easy to steal
A journey inside Mexico’s underground vanilla economy
How to Steal a Masterpiece: Advice from the World’s Greatest Art Thief
Advice from the world's greatest art thief
The Mystery of the Disappearing van Gogh
After a painting by the Dutch artist sold at auction, a movie producer claimed to be the owner. It later vanished from sight, with a trail leading to Caribbean tax havens and a jailed Chinese billionaire.
How a Team of Ambitious Crooks in 1960s Montreal Planned the Biggest Bank Heist Anyone Had Ever Seen
In the spring of 1961, Georges Lemay, a dapper thirty-six-year-old French Canadian, spent his days holed up in his cottage on a private island on a river in the Laurentian Mountains north of Montre…
The Strange Real-Life Mystery Behind Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Black Cat”
George Stebbins was tearing down a stone wall in the cellar of his home in Northfield, Massachusetts when he uncovered the bones. A skull emerged first, then the spine and the bones of the arms and…
Portrait of a killer: art class in one of Mexico’s most notorious prisons
The long read: In 2016, artist César Aréchiga talked one of Mexico’s most dangerous maximum security prisons into letting him run art classes for its inmates, many of them violent gang members. Could he really change their lives?
Most criminal cryptocurrency is funneled through just 5 exchanges
The crypto money-laundering market is tighter than at any time in the past decade, and the few big players are moving a “shocking” amount of currency.
The Schwarzschild defence
Nature - A boost to the ratings.
Inside the Mind-Boggling World of the Antiquities Theft Task Force
You can't make this shit up
Hacker News
The Police Have No Reason to Help You
Cops have been given an incredible set of legal powers immunizing them from the fatal errors of their own decisions—including their decision to do nothing in Uvalde, Texas.
So You Want to Be a Bootlegger | The Saturday Evening Post
In a 1922 Post article, an ex-bootlegger offers advice for how to break into the business.
What is the point of crypto?
Crypto is a solution in search of a problem — or problems.
How Bitcoin Tracers Took Down the Web’s Biggest Child Abuse Site
Welcome to Video’s customers thought their payments were untraceable. They couldn’t have been more wrong. The untold story of the case that shredded the myth of Bitcoin’s anonymity.
$3.6 billion bitcoin seizure shows how hard it is to launder cryptocurrency
A couple allegedly used a “laundry list” of technical measures to cover their tracks. They didn’t work.
Cryptocurrency Is a Giant Ponzi Scheme
Cryptocurrency is not merely a bad investment or speculative bubble. It’s worse than that: it’s a full-on fraud.
The Infamous FBI Informant Behind a 20-Fatality Limo Crash
It was the deadliest U.S. transportation disaster in a decade. The man behind it was one of the most notorious confidential informants in FBI history.
Betting the ranch (Betting The Ranch) — High Country News – Know the West
Cody Easterday wagered hundreds of millions of dollars on the price of beef. He lost.
The lawyer who tried faking his death, and the writer exposing his crime dynasty
Mandy Matney kept a harsh spotlight trained on South Carolina’s Murdaugh family until they became impossible for anyone to ignore
Death of a Lobsterman
On a remote island in Maine, a group of friends thought they witnessed one man killing another with an ax. But no one was ever arrested. In a small town far out at sea, justice sometimes works a little differently.
Companies Linked to Russian Ransomware Hide in Plain Sight
Cybersecurity experts tracing money paid by American businesses to Russian ransomware gangs found it led to one of Moscow’s most prestigious addresses.
The Spine Collector
For five years, a mysterious figure has been stealing books before their release. Is it espionage? Revenge? A trap? Or a complete waste of time?
The Notorious Mrs. Mossler
In the mid-sixties, Candace Mossler was one of the most widely known socialites in Houston. She was in her forties, vivacious and full of charm, with wavy blond hair, deep-blue eyes, and a surgically enhanced figure that was often remarked upon in the many newspaper columns…
The Tomb Raiders of the Upper East Side
Inside the Manhattan DA’s Antiquities Trafficking Unit
What lies beneath: the secrets of France’s top serial killer expert
The long read: An intrepid expert with dozens of books to his name, Stéphane Bourgoin was a bestselling author, famous in France for having interviewed more than 70 notorious murderers. Then an anonymous collective began to investigate his past
‘Every message was copied to the police’: the inside story of the most daring surveillance sting in history
Billed as the most secure phone on the planet, An0m became a viral sensation in the underworld. There was just one problem for anyone using it for criminal means: it was run by the police
The Lost Boys
It was the most shocking crime of its day, 27 boys from the same part of town kidnapped, tortured, and killed by an affable neighbor named Dean Corll. Forty years later, it remains one of the least understood—or talked about—chapters in Houston's history.
The Kingpin of Shanghai
From the depths of poverty, Du Yuesheng rose through Shanghai’s underworld to become one of the most influential, and overlooked, figures in modern China.
Who Killed Cachou the Bear? Murder Mystery in Spain Rattles Conservationists
Conservationists saw the 6-year-old brown bear as a symbol of hope. Villagers saw him as a menace. Then he turned up dead.
Decades After Mysteriously Drowning, Pecos Jane Has a Name – Texas Monthly
The young woman who mysteriously drowned in the Ropers Motel pool in 1966 might have remained anonymous forever, if not for cutting-edge genetics, old-fashioned genealogy—and the kindness of a small West Texas town.
The Snitch - The Atavist Magazine
In Scott Kimball, the FBI thought it had found a high-value informant who could help solve big cases. What it got instead was lies, betrayal, and murder.
The John Patterson Kidnapping in Mexico - The Atlantic
In 1974, John Patterson was abducted by the People’s Liberation Army of Mexico—a group no one had heard of before. The kidnappers wanted $500,000, and insisted that Patterson’s wife deliver the ransom.
Huntsville station
‘It’s a trip just being out’: at the local Greyhound bus station with newly released men from the Texas State Penitentiary