Initiative targets transnational organized crime

Federal law enforcement officials have unveiled a series of initiatives targeting transnational organized crime.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions said the effort stems from an executive order from President Donald Trump to dismantle transnational criminal organizations, which Sessions defined as gangs and cartels who flood the nation’s streets with drugs and violence.

“We embrace that order, and we carry it out every single day,” Sessions said. “To increase our effectiveness, I am putting in place new leadership to drive our transnational organized crime efforts and forming a Transnational Organized Crime Task Force of experienced prosecutors that will coordinate and optimize the Department’s efforts to take each of these groups off of our streets for good.”

To that end, Sessions has appointed Associate Deputy Attorney General Patrick Hovakimian to serve as the Department’s first Director of Counter Transnational Organized Crime while Adam Cohen is the new Director of the Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF).

In conjunction with the Executive Order, Sessions directed the FBI, DEA, OCDETF and the Department’s Criminal Division to identify top transnational criminal groups that threaten the safety and prosperity of the United States and its allies. The review has resulted in designating the following criminal groups as top transnational organized crime threats: MS-13, Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generacion, Sinaloa Cartel, Clan del Golfo and, Lebanese Hezbollah.