Ukraine’s 1991 independence from the Soviet Union caused unchecked economic, social, and political instability that resulted in a proliferation of organized criminal groups operating in the region. The 10 chapters contained in this book present research findings that emerged from a research partnership between Ukrainian and American social scientists who were interested in learning about organized crime in Ukraine in order to effectively combat the problem. Chapter 1 introduces the research partnership between the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) and its Ukrainian counterpart, the Ukrainian Academy of Law Sciences. Chapter 2 introduces a risk assessment instrument designed to rank the relative seriousness of an incident of organized crime for law enforcement targeting purposes. Chapter 3 presents a study that examined the prevalence and etiology of trafficking in women and children in Ukraine. Analyses of the problem revealed four primary reasons for the human trafficking problem in Ukraine: (1) political instability; (2) economic instability; (3) difficult ecological accidents (Chernobyl, etc.); and (4) a low level of public morality. Chapter 4 explores the problem of international money laundering in Ukraine. Chapter 5 examines the various components that comprise the political criminal nexus of trafficking of women in Ukraine. Data indicate that 65 percent of the human trafficking cases are attributed to organized crime groups operating in Ukraine. Chapter 6 examines the factors that contribute to the high prevalence of criminal economic activity in Ukraine. Chapter 7 examines the drug smuggling operations that emerged in Ukraine and provides a methodology for estimating the magnitude of the amount of heroin transiting through Ukraine. Factors contributing to the utilization of Ukraine as a conduit for the drug trade include porous borders, understaffed and underfunded counter-narcotics entities, and the rise of organized crime networks. Chapter 8 discusses the entanglement of businesses and organized criminal networks in Ukraine. Chapter 9 describes the development of organized crime in Ukraine and discusses the efforts to curb the activities of organized criminal networks. Finally, chapter 10 sketches the first comprehensive behavioral crime model for Ukrainian organized criminal groups relying on both quantitative and qualitative Ukrainian data about organized criminal groups. Tables of contents, index