Russian Organized Crime (ROC)The term “Russian organized crime” (ROC) refers to criminal groups in the 15 republics that made up the former Soviet Union. The ROC has existed for 20 years in the United States, but over the past five years, law enforcement authorities have observed a marked increase in their criminal activities. Criminals from the former Soviet Union have established their networks in major cities and are also emerging in some smaller cities. ROC groups are involved in murder, money laundering, extortion, auto theft, arms smuggling, drug trafficking, prostitution, currency counterfeiting, and a host of complex fraud schemes. In the United States, the ROC evolved in Brighton Beach, New York, which at one time was a small community of Russian immigrants. During the 1970s and early 1980s, the Soviet government liberalized its immigration policies, allowing its citizens to immigrate and travel freely. About 200,000 Soviet citizens immigrated to the United States to escape the religious persecution they endured during 70 years of communist rule. It was during this time that many Soviet criminals came to the United States under the pretext of fleeing this religious oppression. Additionally, some U.S. government officials suspect that the KGB emptied its prisons of hardened criminals, much like Cuban dictator Fidel Castro did during the Mariel boatlift in 1980. After the After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, many Russian criminals and organized crime figures fled to the United States. In 1992, Russian authorities alerted American law enforcement of the arrival in New York of Vyacheslav Ivankov, identified as one of the leaders of the "Thieves in Law", who are a tra...... middle of paper.... ..9.Francis AJ Ianni, A Family Business, 1972.Thomas E. Dewey, Twenty against the Underworld, 1974.Alan Block and William Chambliss, Organizing Crime, 1981.President's Commission on Organized Crime , The Impact: Organized Crime Today (Report to the President and Attorney General), 1986. Stephen Fox, Blood and Power, 1989.G. Robert Blakey, “RICO: The Federal Experience (Criminal and Civil) and an Analysis of Attacks against the Statute,” in Handbook of Organized Crime in the United States (Robert J. Kelly et al., eds.), 1994. Michael Maltz , “Defining Organized Crime,” in Handbook of Organized Crime in the United States (Robert J. Kelly et al., eds.), 1994. Rufus Schatzberg and Robert J. Kelly, African-American Organized Crime, 1997. James B. Jacobs, Gotham Unbound, 1999. Robert J. Kelly, The Upper World and the Underworld, 1999.