Dr. Rolando Ochoa is a Lecturer at the Department of Security Studies and Criminology, Macquarie University, Sydney. He holds a PhD in Sociology and an MPhil in Latin American Studies, both from the University of Oxford, UK. His interests include the history and political economy of kidnapping in Mexico, the impact of organized crime on fragile/weak states, an organized crime and drug policy in general. He is very interested in how individuals solve issues of trust and reputation in contexts of weak rule of law and inside criminal organizations. He was born in Mexico City and still focuses a significant part of his research there, which he is lately expanding to the Asia Pacific region.