Those who miss payments are beaten, or worse. Their families back home can also be targeted. Sometimes the gangs insist that families borrow to pay the fees right away, sending home a sliced-off ear or finger of a loved one to make their point. Countries are cooperating to choke off the smuggling routes, but it's a struggle. The penalties for getting caught are often milder than for shipping drugs.
Traffickers find new channels to experiment with as legitimate global commerce accelerates.
It's a new, globalized Mafia. Its biggest players are Chinese gangs called snakeheads. The dead in Dover came overland. Police won't confirm the exact journey as described by the two survivors, who were rushed to hospital and then released to a police safe house, but relatives of the victims, who had been staying in periodic touch by phone until the calls stopped coming last week, say it began in Fujian province and included Russia, the Czech Republic, Germany and the Netherlands. By coincidence, a group of 60 Chinese was detained by Belgian authorities in April, but quickly released because the regional detention center was full.