Reorganizing Crime
Slade, Gavin / Tarasov, Mikhail
Thieves-in-law' (vory-v-zakone in Russian) are career criminals belonging to a criminal fraternity that began in the 1930s in the Soviet prison camps. For reasons that the book attempts to explain, thieves-in-law became exceptionally prevalent in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Here, by the 1990s, they formed a mafia network--criminal associations that attempt to monopolize protection in legal and illegal sectors of the economy. At this...