Cross-Border Gang Violence in the Caribbean: A Growing Threat & How Law Enforcement Must Respond
By Mark Collins, Former Chief Constable & Police Commissioner - mcollins@traceintel.com
Throughout my career in law enforcement, from leading intelligence-led policing strategies in the UK to tackling organized crime in the Caribbean, one reality remains clear, criminals do not recognize borders. While national sovereignty is fundamental, the criminal underworld operates seamlessly across jurisdictions, exploiting weak enforcement collaboration and gaps in intelligence sharing.
In the Caribbean, one of the most pressing concerns today is the rise of transnational gang violence, where criminal groups travel from one nation to another to commit violent crimes, including murder, and return home freely. This strategy allows them to avoid retaliation from rival gangs, escape local law enforcement, and evade prosecution due to international legal complexities. Having served as Commissioner of Police in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and worked closely with agencies in the United States Virgin Islands (USVI), I have witnessed firsthand how gangs use the proximity of these islands to their advantage. Criminal groups in BVI and USVI frequently collaborate, carrying out targeted assassinations across borders to settle disputes while avoiding local retaliation and prosecution.
This issue extends beyond the USVI-BVI corridor. Throughout the Caribbean, gangs are not just moving drugs and weapons but also outsourcing violence. A well-documented pattern in the region is the outsourcing of contract killings to criminals from neighboring islands. It is now common for gangs in BVI, Anguilla, and USVI to hire hitmen from each other’s territories to eliminate rivals, knowing that these “imported” gunmen are harder to trace and will likely flee the jurisdiction immediately after committing the crime. The proximity of the islands makes this an effective strategy, killers arrive on a speedboat, commit the murder, and leave before local law enforcement can react. These cross-border executions add an additional layer of complexity to gang-related homicides, making it harder to determine the direct perpetrators and significantly slowing down investigations.
One case during my tenure in the BVI particularly illustrated this issue. Intelligence suggested that a known gang in the USVI had contracted a shooter from Anguilla to carry out a murder in the BVI, a tactic designed to ensure that the killing could not be traced back to them. The suspect arrived under the guise of a casual traveler, committed the hit, and was off the island before authorities could even identify the connection. These types of murders, planned with precision and carried out by external actors, make gang investigations in the region far more challenging. The lack of a unified intelligence database between Caribbean nations, combined with limited extradition agreements, allows these criminals to exploit jurisdictional gaps and move freely between islands after committing violent crimes.
Gangs operating between Jamaica, Haiti, and the Bahamas have also refined these methods, leveraging their networks to recruit hitmen who have no ties to the local communities in which they are sent to kill. This lack of connection to the crime scene means that standard investigative techniques, such as witness identification and community-based intelligence, become far less effective. Law enforcement agencies in Trinidad and Tobago, St. Kitts, and other Caribbean nations report similar issues, where criminals are flown in or arrive by boat for a specific job and leave immediately afterward, making detection nearly impossible without real-time intelligence sharing.
This issue is further compounded by the Caribbean’s geographical vulnerabilities. The porous borders, unpatrolled waters, and ease of movement between small islands mean that criminal organizations can traffic weapons, narcotics, and people while evading detection. The BVI and USVI, for example, serve as crucial transit points for South American cocaine destined for the US mainland, often smuggled by gangs that use legitimate, looking transport networks to disguise their illicit activities. Belize has also become a key player in the movement of drugs, with Mexican cartels leveraging the porous Belize-Mexico border to funnel narcotics and people into the United States.
The key to combating this transnational gang problem is enhanced intelligence sharing and coordinated enforcement strategies. Right now, law enforcement agencies across the Caribbean are forced to work in silos, only sharing intelligence when it is requested or when a major case makes cooperation unavoidable. This reactive approach is exactly what criminal organizations exploit. To truly disrupt these networks, Caribbean nations must establish a centralized criminal intelligence database that enables real-time data access for law enforcement officers across all jurisdictions. Officers should be able to immediately verify if a suspect is a known gang member in another country, whether they are linked to past investigations, and if they have prior connections to violent crime. Without this, we are allowing criminals to slip through the cracks.
Extradition agreements between Caribbean nations also need to be revisited. The ease with which criminals can commit murder in one country and retreat home to avoid prosecution undermines the rule of law and emboldens gangs to continue outsourcing their violence. A regional fugitive apprehension task force should be developed, modeled after the United States Marshal’s Fugitive Task Forces, to track and arrest gang members attempting to evade justice by crossing borders.
Beyond enforcement, preventing gang violence before it happens must also be a priority. The Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police (ACCP) Conference presents an opportunity for regional law enforcement leaders to strengthen intelligence sharing agreements and formalize operational frameworks that ensure better collaboration between countries. Commissioners should continue to use this forum to create policies that allow officers to share intelligence more efficiently, implement regional surveillance operations, and develop consistent policing strategies that make it harder for gangs to operate across jurisdictions.
I have spent decades working on law enforcement leadership, intelligence-driven policing, and counter-organized crime efforts. One key lesson remains constant, no agency can fight these challenges alone. The Caribbean is facing a serious cross-border crime problem, and the only way to combat it effectively is through stronger collaboration, intelligence sharing, and technology driven policing. The more fragmented our enforcement efforts are, the more power we give to the criminals exploiting the gaps.
Faster Investigations. Smarter Policing. Safer Streets.
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