Joint investigation teams (JIT) are law enforcement and judicial teams set up jointly by EU national investigative agencies to handle cross-border crime. Joint investigation teams coordinate the investigations and prosecutions conducted in parallel by several countries.

Description

A Joint Investigation Team (JIT) is formed based upon an agreement between competent authorities – both judicial (judges, prosecutors, investigative judges) and law enforcement – of two or more

member states A member state is a state that is a member of an international organization or of a federation or confederation. Since the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) include some members that are not sovereign states ...

of the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

(EU). They can be backed up by

Eurojust Eurojust is an agency of the European Union (EU) dealing with judicial co-operation in criminal matters among agencies of the member states. It is seated in The Hague, Netherlands. Established in 2002, it was created to improve handling of serio ...

and Europol, the EU judicial and law enforcement agencies. Their terms of operation are based on Europol's Model Agreement for Setting up a Joint Investigation Team, as appended to Council of Europe Resolution 2017/C 18/01.

History

After the shootdown of

Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17/MAS17) was a scheduled passenger flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur that was shot down by Russian forces on 17 July 2014, while flying over eastern Ukraine. All 283 passengers and 15 crew were killed. Cont ...

in July 2014, a joint investigation team conducting criminal investigation with representatives from

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

and

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

was formed. A JIT was formed in April 2020 by the French

National Gendarmerie The National Gendarmerie (french: Gendarmerie nationale, ) is one of two national law enforcement forces of France, along with the National Police. The Gendarmerie is a branch of the French Armed Forces placed under the jurisdiction of the Minis ...

and the

Dutch police National Police Corps ( nl, Korps Nationale Politie), colloquially in English as Dutch National Police or National Police Force, is divided in ten regional units, a central unit, the police academy, police services center, and national control ...

to investigate the secure communication service

EncroChat EncroChat was a Europe-based communications network and service provider that offered modified smartphones allowing encrypted communication among subscribers. It was used primarily by organized crime members to plan criminal activities. Police ...

, used by some 60,000 subscribers at the time of its closure; nearly all of them were criminals.

References

External links

{{law-enforcement-stub Criminal investigation International criminal law Teams Collaboration Malaysia Airlines Flight 17