Sex workers in Europe are increasingly of nonnational origin. The Schengen cooperation allows internal migration within the European Union, but many migrant sex workers originate from outside the EU. While sex workers are already in precarious positions, nonnationals risk deportation, dependent on their citizenship status, and may have debts to smugglers. Consequently, they may be more likely to work longer hours to increase short-term profits. Using a dataset of sex work advertisements from one Danish website (n = 2,594), we estimate the association between inferred citizenship status and a) advertised hours on shift using ordinary least squares regression, and b) the probability of advertising 24/7 availability using a linear probability model. Compared to Danish sex workers, we find migrants advertise almost twice as many hours on shift and are more likely to advertise 24/7 availability. These results shed light on the inequalities that persist between national and nonnational sex workers.

Speeding in traffic is a key factor in road deaths and accidents. A largescale randomized controlled trial of an online intervention against speeding offenses in northern Denmark is ongoing. Preliminary quantitative results were presented at ESC 2023 and the final results will be ready by 2025. This study aims at improving our understanding of the theoretical mechanisms that influence speeding behavior. To improve the effectiveness of the intervention, we interviewed potential future participants about underlying beliefs related to speeding as part of the development of the intervention as well as people who had completed the intervention. Pre-intervention study consists of 24 semi-structured interviews, evenly distributed on sex, severity of speeding violation (over/under 30% of legal limit), and geography (town/country). Post-intervention study consists of 32 semi-structured interviews, selected from 240 participants in the intervention, oversampling the most serious speed offenders, in terms of their assessed likelihood of speeding again. Using directed content analysis, we examined participant’s motivations for speeding, highlighting the mechanisms in the theory of planned behavior, in terms of costs and benefits. The pre-intervention interviews assessed behavioral beliefs on the advantages of speeding concerned saving time, avoiding boredom, while the shame of potential criminal sanction was a cost. Normatively, participants believed almost everyone speeds, and that it is mostly unacceptable in urban areas, particularly in the vicinity of schools.S peed limits were seen as guidelines, necessary to curb “idiots”. Control beliefs pertain to work-related stress, low risk of apprehension, and habits. The perceived costs of speeding increase with age, and when (others) children are in the vehicle. The post-intervention interviews were generally favorable to the intervention design, particularly the surprising information of lack of efficacy of speeding. Interviewees generally expected to reduce their speeding following the intervention.

The cryptomarket ecosystem has become increasingly volatile and fragmented with sites shutting down on short notice. Displacement to new marketplaces is tricky when the original location was domestically oriented. We examine the spatial and temporal displacement of 83 Swedish vendors in the aftermath of the Flugsvamp 3.0 shutdown. Vendors rejected the successor Flugsvamp 4.0 and moved to German-run Archetyp Market. Using quantitative cross-sectional data from Archetyp Market we measure bivariate correlations between the temporal displacement and status-related variables. We found moderately strong correlation between vendors' number of sales per day and the order of their relocation to Archetyp. We also examined cryptomarket discussion forums and blogs during the time of the Flugsvamp 3.0 shutdown. This qualitative data supported the finding that migration choices of high-status vendors inspired others to follow.

Based on previous research, members of street gangs are more likely to be both perpetrators and victims of crime. In addition, many known risk factors seem to accumulate for street gang- affiliated youth. However, the importance of street gang affiliation seems to go beyond, for example, having criminally active friends. In this presentation, we utilize representative city samples collected from Nordic adolescents (aged 13–17) to investigate the degree to which theory-based criminological risk factors explain the link between street gang membership and criminal behavior and victimization experiences. Our analysis is based on Nordic data collected as part of the fourth International Self-Report Delinquency Study (ISRD4) and logistic regression modelling utilizing the KHB decomposition method. The Eurogang measurement is used to identify adolescents’ street gang membership. In our empirical analysis, we examine the criminal behavior and victimization experiences among gang-affiliated and non-gang adolescents, and how key criminological theories help to understand the connection between adolescent street gangs and crime. In addition, we compare whether studied risk factors play a different role for criminal behavior and victimization experiences.    

Law enforcement in Sweden, and several other European countries, gained access to the content of chats between users of encrypted PGP-phone services. The contents of the chats led to the prosecution of members from 60 criminal groups for aggravated drug offenses, homicides, and more. I use the contents of court documents from 146 lower court and 85 higher court cases, to map the aggravated drugs offenses and violence committed by each group. For the drug offenses, I describe severity of offending, and detail which drug types each group sold. For the violence, I count the types of violence, with a focus on the homicides they committed, planned, and had others commit on their behalf. This material constitutes a more representative sample of criminal group offending than usual because the evidence was not from police-initiated investigations, that could result in a sample of less-capable offenders. 

Government action plans on violence against women include a focus on honor-related crimes, but for the past ten years there is limited research, and Swedish authorities receive only few reports. There is a large dark figure. In this study, we focus on the honor-related crimes, as defined by Swedish law, that do not pertain directly to violence, or female circumcision.

In Swedish law, the most important remnant categories pertain to forced marriages, underage marriage, and arranging travels abroad for these purposes. Many of these offenses do not come to the attention of police by victims reporting. Rather, for these offenses, the criminal justice process begins with social workers reporting a suspicion. There is an administrative recommendation for social workers to report suspicion of these offenses, but there is no requirement.

Using a sample of interviews with social workers, we examine arguments for and against reporting suspicion through a qualitative lens. Our theoretical framework derives from prior studies on reporting propensity and the Blackian concept of social distance and access to law. We present findings in relation to perceptions of costs and advantages of reporting, access to potential witnesses, completion of the criminal process, alternatives to criminal sanctioning.

This study examines whether unstructured and structured activities interact in their association with delinquency and cannabis use. We hypothesize that unstructured activities are more strongly associated with delinquency and cannabis use for those who are less engaged in structured activities. Data are drawn from three nationally representative self-report studies conducted between 2005 and 2011 in Sweden, and include 19,644 adolescents. The results support the hypothesis that unstructured activities interact with structured activities in the association with delinquency and cannabis use. The association between unstructured activities and these outcomes is stronger for those with lower levels of structured activities. Sporting activities constitute the structured activity that most clearly interacts with unstructured activities in the association with delinquency and cannabis use.

Objectives: A high number of street dealers operate in the Red Light District in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. To displace the dealers, the Municipality of Amsterdam installed text-based light projections in a street attracting a high number of dealers.

Methods: To evaluate the intervention, we did a pre-post analysis of video footage from two CCTV cameras located in the street. In total, we analyzed 765 one-minute segments of footage from before and after the implementation.

Results: The implementation was followed by a four percentage point reduction in street dealers. However, the estimated effect shows fragileness with wide confidence intervals and a p-value just below 0.05, and a Bayesian robustness analysis suggests that the intervention was not associated with the outcome.

Conclusions: Analyzing CCTV-footage offers a unique avenue for evaluating small scale interventions in open-air drug markets. While we observed a decrease in the presence of dealers, the intervention still needs further validation.

A high number of street dealers operate in the open-air drug market in the Red Light District in Amsterdam, The Netherlands selling cocaine and ecstasy to visitors. This is a nuisance to shop owners and inhabitants in the area. To mitigate this problem, the Municipality of Amsterdam installed three text-based light projections on the pavement and walls of a specific street known for attracting high numbers of dealers. The text discouraged visitors from buying drugs from street dealers. The aim of the intervention was to displace dealers from the specific street to surrounding areas. In order to investigate the influence of this intervention, we collected and analyzed video footage from two CCTV cameras located in the street. We analyzed a total of 765 one-minute segments of video footage from before and after the intervention was implemented. The analysis of the video footage showed that there were statistically significantly fewer street dealers observed in the street after the intervention was implemented. This difference amounted to an approximately 25 percent reduction of observed street dealers, when we controlled for time of day, day of the week, and the crowding of the area. These results indicate that the light-based interventions successfully discouraged street dealers from operating in the street. This influence of the intervention might be connected to the nature of the Open-Air Drug market in the Red Light District, which is almost exclusively catering to tourists and where dealers are constantly moving around rather than standing still. The generalizability of the current study to other open-air drug markets therefore remains uncertain.