Samenvatting

Property crime committed by itinerant offender groups originating from Eastern and South-Eastern Europe, as well as the Balkan countries, is a problem that confronts almost all countries in North-Western and Western Europe. An underexposed problem is that the members of such perpetrator groups not only commit crimes voluntarily, but may also be forced and considered victims of criminal exploitation. This paper examines how mobile organised crime groups (MOCGs) operate in this regard, which opportunity structures they use, and how public and private actors may better tackle criminal exploitation in the context of mobile banditry. The causes are complex and a combination of individual characteristics of offenders and victims, the effectiveness with which offender groups can organise their criminal business processes, and systemic factors such as the economic and social disadvantaged positions of individuals and the communities they come from. A combination of repression, prevention, and increasing the resilience of individuals and communities is therefore needed, in close cooperation between countries of origin and destination of MOCGs.