Itena Dhrami is an Adjunct Lecturer at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. She is an Intelligence Analyst working for the Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor, a bi-state law enforcement agency mandated to investigate, deter, combat, and remedy the influence of organized crime in the port district.

Previously, she was an Intelligence Analyst, working for the New York City Business Integrity Commission, Background Investigations Unit with a focus on organized crime. She was a Research Analyst with the Research Foundation of the City of New York, working on exploring the topics of transnational crime, terrorism, human trafficking, and human smuggling. This position followed her role as a Research Assistant with John Jay College of Criminal Justice Investigative Psychology Research Unit, a two-year collaboration with the Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Behavioral Science Unit (BSU).

Her work focused on analyzing crime scenes of adjudicated serial homicide cases, on creating an applicable model of empirical profiling that would link homicide cases, based on evidence collected at the crime scene. Prior to joining John Jay College of Criminal Justice, she worked as a Research Assistant at Columbia University in the City of New York where she was a member of the Editorial Review Board of Columbia University Undergraduate Science Journal.

She received her undergraduate degree from Columbia University in the City of New York in 2010. At John Jay College of Criminal Justice, the City University of New York, she graduated with an MA in Forensic Psychology and an MA in International Crime and Justice. She is currently receiving an MA in Global Security Studies and Intelligence from Johns Hopkins University and a certificate in International Studies from Harvard University.

She was born in Albania. In her native country, she worked as a Humanitarian Aid Worker for United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees (UNHCR) where she participated in collecting testimonies from war victims to be presented at the International Criminal Court (ICC) and provided first assistance to refugees crossing the border from Kosovo to Albania, and victims of rape and long-term abuse.

She was a Humanitarian Aid Worker for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). Under the guidance and training of UNICEF, CARE International, and NATO, she was a Community Facilitator for increasing awareness against the danger of Mines and Weapons during the War in Kosovo. In addition, she was an interviewer for CARE International during the Emergency Livelihood Assessment (ELSA) of Albanian families hosting Kosovo Refugees.

As part of the GI-TOC’s network of experts, Itena has been part of the group of experts responsible for doing the country assessment for GI-TOC’s flagship product – the Global Organized Crime Index. She has contributed at different stages of the Index development, scoring a number of East Asian countries over both the inaugural and the 2023 iterations of the tool.