NCJ Number
108891
Date Published
1984
Length
534 pages
Annotation
This transcript of a 3-day hearing (October 23-25, 1984, in New York City) by the President's Commission on Organized Crime focuses on the nature and activities of criminal groups in the United States whose members have ethnic origins in China, Japan, and Vietnam.
Abstract
Testimony was offered by numerous Federal and local law enforcement officials, police officers in foreign jurisdictions such as Toronto and Amsterdam, and numerous cooperative and noncooperative witnesses with firsthand knowledge of the activities of Asian criminal groups. The testimony examined the nature of Asian Triad Societies, known also as 'secret societies' or 'black societies,' rooted in hundreds of years of Chinese history. Testimony explored the relationship between these groups and the Tongs and Asian street gangs and the groups' responsibility for about 20 percent of the heroin imported into the United States from Southeast Asia. Witnesses identified the developing Asian connection of La Cosa Nostra and the international money laundering capabilities of the Triad heroin networks. Evidence presented indicates that some money laundering operations are being displaced from Hong Kong, and entire criminal organizations may be migrating from there to the United States and other countries. Testimony on the Japanese organized crime group known as the Yakuza included information from a Yakuza insider familiar with Yakuza activities in Southern California. Witnesses also provided information on the emerging problem of violent Vietnamese gangs in Southern California, Houston, New Orleans, and Arlington, Virginia. The appendix contains prepared statements, photos, and illustrations.