Slovak mafia
Slovenská mafia | |
| Founded | Early 1990s |
|---|---|
| Named after | Individual groups are usually named after their founders |
| Founding location | Slovakia |
| Years active | 1990s–present |
| Territory | Slovakia |
| Ethnicity | Primarily Slovaks |
| Membership | 3 to 25 for a group, possibly more |
| Activities | Racketeering, loan sharking, extortion, bribery, business infiltration, political corruption, illegal gambling, money laundering, fraud, theft, larceny, robbery, burglary, smuggling, drug trafficking, arms trafficking, human trafficking, kidnapping, assault, murder, bombing, arson, assassination |
| Rivals |
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The Slovak mafia (Slovak: Slovenská mafia) constitutes various organized crime groups in Slovakia, controlled primarily by Slovak interests. The Slovak mafia does not have significant international presence and even in Slovakia, their activities are limited by boundaries set by the powerful Russian mafia, Ukrainian mafia, Chechen mafia, and various Balkan groups controlling much of the heroin trade.
The Slovak mafia is traditionally especially active in security business, construction, and ownership of restaurants and nightclubs. According to the United States Department of State, "Both indigenous and foreign organized crime groups are well established in Slovakia". Under Slovak law, the creation, membership, activity, or support of an organized crime group constitutes a crime.
In its modern form, the mafia is a young phenomenon in Slovakia, having truly emerged only after the revolutions of 1989. According to known Slovak sociologist Pavol Haulik from the MVK poll agency, "We can state that people imagine that the mafia has a very strong influence in Slovakia". In 2005, a list of mafia members, families and "special interest groups" suspected by the Slovak police leaked to the public, complete with lists of registered weapons and vehicles followed by two leaks of updated lists in 2011.
Today, the Slovak mafia as it existed in c. 1990–2012 is said to be gone. There are, however, many, mainly "under-the-radar", drug gangs or criminal networks that participate mainly in the illegal drug trade and other related activities, such as money laundering. These groups may or may not include smaller and/or less known, perhaps unknown and/or unnamed organizations. Some groups may also not meet the definition of a mafia-style group, and can therefore be referred to as criminal networks, or loose networks of associates engaging in criminal activity who fail to meet the defining characteristics of mafia-style groups, while still being a part of organized crime. Different forms of the mafia are also speculated to exist.