PaCCS Placement Opportunity with the National Intelligence Unit for Serious Organised Acquisitive Crime

UKRI’s Partnership for Conflict, Crime & Security Research (PaCCS) is seeking a researcher to undertake a placement, spending three months working with Opal – the National Intelligence Unit for Serious Organised Acquisitive Crime. Opal has an interest in the criminal disposal routes and markets for catalytic converters, with a focus on processes associated with extraction of precious metals. This placement is part of the PaCCS programme Transnational Organised Crime (TNOC): Deepening & Broadening Our Understanding.

The placement will entail discussions with relevant stakeholders; reading documents, reviewing police data and interviewing experts in extraction processes. Findings will need to be collated and analysed before drafting an OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE Assessment which can be easily understood by policy audiences. This report will be the key output of this placement and will be used by Opal to inform policy thinking.  

The successful candidate will have strong academic grounding in either Arts, Humanities, Social or Behavioural Science and be continuing to conduct research in at least one of these areas.  The candidate will have strong analytical skills, strong oral and written communication skills. The post is best-suited to those studying towards a PhD where the PaCCS funding (in the form of a Student Maintenance Grant) would allow – with the support of UKRI and the necessary approval of the researcher’s university – three months to be “taken out” to work on this placement. Those who are engaged in post-doctoral research are also eligible to apply. It would be very helpful if the successful candidate exhibits knowledge and understanding of issues surrounding TNOC in general and the organisations involved in acquisitive crime in particular. It is also desirable to be able to demonstrate evidence of team-working and a commitment to work across relevant disciplines. The candidate should be able to demonstrate an understanding of the link between research, policy and operations. 

The funds for this placement are available for 3 months between September and November 2021. The posting will be subject to final clearance from OPAL.

You can learn more about this placement opportunity – including how to apply – here.