The Friends of the Wildlife Justice Commission is an independent U.S. entity whose board of prominent conservation, legal, and policy leaders supports the mission and vision of the Wildlife Justice Commission (WJC). The Friends of WJC amplifies WJC’s work in the United States, helping to raise awareness of wildlife trafficking as a serious, organized, and transnational crime.
The Wildlife Justice Commission itself is a non-profit organization founded in 2016 to disrupt trafficking in wild animals, timber, and fish by combining intelligence-led investigations, technical assistance to law enforcement, and legal analysis. WJC works at the intersection of conservation, criminal justice, and rule of law, with field operations in West and Central Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America — some of the highest-pressure trafficking regions in the world. Recent WJC reports, including “Disruption and Disarray” and “Is Wildlife Trafficking Being Treated as Serious Crime?”, have informed international policy debates on whether trafficking is being addressed with the seriousness it warrants.
The Friends of WJC board currently includes Professor Dr. Edgardo Buscaglia (an authority on legal and economic analysis of organized crime), Heather Grady, Ellen O’Connell, and Olivia Swaak-Goldman.
