On 14 April 2020, Eurojust published its Annual Report for the year 2019. In 2019, Eurojust once again saw an increase in its casework, with 3892 new cases and 3912 ongoing cases from previous years. The majority of new cases in 2019 dealt with swindling and fraud (1111), money laundering (527), and drug trafficking (461). 545 of these cases also involved third states. In total, Eurojust dealt with over 8000 cases in 2019, the largest number in its history. Nearly 1100 Eurojust cases were solved through a rapid response, providing support within hours if necessary. Furthermore, 103 new agreements for Joint Investigation Teams (JITs) were signed in 2019 compared to 85 new JITs in 2018.

Looking at crime priority areas, in 2019, Eurojust worked on new cases of drug trafficking (461), migrant smuggling (187), THB (183), cybercrime (125), terrorism (94), and 12 new cases concerning environmental crime. In the area of counter-terrorism, the Judicial Counter-Terrorism Register was established at Eurojust on 1 September 2019 to detect possible links between ongoing investigations conducted in different Member States and to identify the coordination needs between all judicial authorities concerned.

Developments with regard to Eurojust’s cooperation with third States included new cooperation agreements with Serbia and Georgia. The USA and Switzerland each posted second Liaison Officers to Eurojust.

Eurojust’s support in the area of mutual recognition and the use of judicial cooperation tools in 2019 featured assistance in over 2146 cases involving European Investigation Orders and 1277 cases involving European Arrest Warrants. Furthermore, Eurojust published several guidelines and handbooks such as the Guidelines for deciding on competing requests for surrender and extradition.

Lastly, the report outlines Eurojust’s transition to becoming the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation, which is based on the new Eurojust Regulation that entered into force in 2019. Looking ahead, Eurojust will continue to contribute to the discussions on the need for Digital Criminal Justice.