Dr Nick Ridley is currently an associate researcher at the John Grieve Centre.
He was a criminal  intelligence analyst for just over 22 years, firstly at the Metropolitan Police, New Scotland Yard, working in various departments including Special Branch and the Anti Terrorist Branch, and then at Europol, the EU law enforcement agency in The Hague. At both Scotland Yard and Europol he specialised in organised crime from south east Europe, financial crime and financing of terrorism. At Europol he was attached to Anti Terrorist Unit where he was responsible for the operational analysis of financing of terrorism. In 2002 he was seconded to the FBI headquarters Washington, engaged on analysis on financing of terrorism.


Nick holds a first degree in History from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, a Diploma in International Economic Relations from the Economics Faculty University of Budapest, Hungary and a PhD from the University of Southampton. His doctorate thesis concerned Financial Crime and money laundering in Eastern Europe in the pre and post communist eras, and the role of the central banks.  He also holds qualifications in French and Serbian from the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry.


After 11 years at Europol, he took up a short term position as associate professor at the Catholic University in Milan, Italy, teaching courses in intelligence analysis, international relations and terrorism to postgraduate students in Masters and PhD courses. He is a current holder of a Research Fellowship from the Airey Neave Trust researching an aspect of terrorist financing.

His publications include since 1995 to present day various articles for financial crime journals, such as : The Money Laundering Bulletin, Compliance Monitor, The Banker, Journal of Money Laundering Control (Institute of Advanced Legal Studies
Journal of Financial Crime (Institute of Advanced Legal Studies) and JANES Information Group.


In 2006 to 2007 he contributed

• Mid 2006 Volume 86 Berichte & Studen, the journal of the Hans Seidel Stiftung Akademie fur Politichk und Zeitgeschehen (Academy of Politics and International Relations), Munich Germany, entitled, “The Economy of Terrorism”. It examines the question of whether Islamic extremist terrorism is indeed a planned and co-ordinated campaign of economic warfare.

• the March 2006 edition of the Money Laundering Bulletin, “Italian snapshot,” concerning Italian efforts to counter international terrorism.

• September 2006 edition of the Journal of Money Laundering Control, entitled, “Financial enmeshment - the interacting factors of anti money laundering, the rigours of transitional economy and the underground illicit economy”. It concerns an overview of the transition economies of central and south-eastern Europe, their banking systems and the attempts to combat money laundering and deal with the effects of the underground economy.

• September 2006 edition of Money Laundering Bulletin, “Romanian Perspective” concerning an overview of Romania from 2000 to present day and her efforts to combat corruption and financial crime.

• March 2007 Journal of the Institute of Economic Affairs, “Financial Crime Trends in Central and Eastern Europe”

• March 2007 edition of the Journal of Money Laundering Control, “Bank mergers and murky waters” concerning the potential involvement of criminal groups, insider dealing and bank mergers and the role of the Italian Central Bank.
  
  
  (2007 publications were completed and published on behalf of the John Grieve Centre - London Metropolitan University.)