Group Affiliation

This chapter examines the role of group affiliation in crime pattern analysis, emphasizing how offender and victim connections to groups can shape criminal behavior, target selection, and investigative outcomes. Affiliations may be non-criminal – such as employment, education, family, religious, or online networks – or explicitly criminal, including gangs, cartels, organized theft rings, terrorist organizations, and cybercrime groups. Understanding these ties provides investigators with insights into an offender’s resources, skills, and motivations, while also helping explain why certain victims are targeted. Group structures often supply knowledge, logistical support, and ideological reinforcement, making affiliation a critical variable in both individual offending and collective crime patterns. The case of Gérald Gallant, a contract killer aligned with the Rock Machine motorcycle gang, illustrates how group membership dictated victim selection, methods, and timing during Quebec’s Biker War. This chapter highlights how analyzing both formal and informal affiliations – through social network analysis, surveillance, financial records, and informants – can uncover hidden actors, clarify roles, and identify disruption points within organized criminal networks.