Caribbean gun trafficking tied to hubs in Florida and Georgia, study finds

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By Sarah Morland

Dec 2 (Reuters) – Organized crime in the Caribbean is being fueled by arms trafficking that can be traced largely to a handful of areas in the U.S. states of Florida and Georgia, a study by Geneva-based Small Arms Survey has found.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has ramped up efforts against drug cartels, from classifying gangs as terrorist organizations to bombing alleged drug trafficking boats off the coast of Venezuela.

The Small Arms Survey – an independent research project whose findings are used by international governments and United Nations bodies – found that between 2015 and 2024, seven in 10 firearms that could be traced from six Caribbean nations came from Florida and Georgia.

Its analysis spanned the Bahamas, Barbados, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Some 30% of all firearms seized in those countries and successfully traced to the U.S. were bought from dealers in just two counties in Florida – Miami-Dade and Broward.

The mayors of those counties did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The report also looked at seizures by U.S. Customs officials, finding that 78% of Caribbean-bound illegal arms shipments were detected in ports around the Florida cities of Tampa and Miami, and Atlanta, Georgia.

Matt Schroeder, a senior researcher at the Small Arms Survey, noted that limited data on arms trafficking made it difficult to assess how trends were evolving, and called for further research.

“Any effective campaign against drug trafficking and organized crime has to look at the trafficking of weapons,” he said in an interview.

The issue has fueled diplomatic tensions in the region, with several countries across the Caribbean backing a Mexican government lawsuit that sought to hold U.S. gunmakers responsible for weapons trafficking to foreign crime groups. The U.S. Supreme Court threw out the lawsuit earlier this year.

Schroeder said strikes on alleged drug boats were unlikely to have a major impact on arms trafficking, and warned against possible diversion of resources away from U.S. Customs or U.S. law enforcement operations in the Caribbean. 

“If you’re going to have any meaningful decrease in the trafficking of weapons, it has to focus on improving the capacity of law enforcement specifically to detect contraband in the international shipments,” Schroeder said.

The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the U.S. agency that investigates illegal firearms use, has identified the Bahamas and Haiti as among the top markets for illegal U.S. firearms. It has said that growing gang power in Haiti has prevented the agency from obtaining accurate trace data since 2021.

(Reporting by Sarah Morland in Mexico CityEditing by Matthew Lewis)