Afternoon Shadow is an interstellar criminal organization engaged in various criminal activities on numerous worlds of the Republic.  It is the most prominent of numerous interstellar organized crime rings known to exist within the Republic; the exact membership is unknown however (thought to be in the hundreds of thousands across all worlds).  The activities of Afternoon Shadow have included drug trafficking, racketeering, legal and illegal gambling operations, smuggling, extortion, prostitution, and even slave trade on several lower law level worlds.  In recent years, a number of scandals linking prominent officials in the Republic to Afternoon Shadow have surfaced.  Whether or not there is widespread corruption within the Republic associated with Afternoon Shadow is a topic of frequent debate.