Financial Crime Online

Usually hawaladers come from the East. This time he came from the South. The owner of Bem Brazil in Danbury (CT) was sentenced to 30 months in prison for unlicensed money transfers. The indictment alleged that, in exchange for remitting more than $22,000,000 from Connecticut to Brazil and for guaranteeing the anonymity of both their [...]

A disaster earthquake hit Haiti. Over a 110.000 people lost their lives. A lot more are homeless and without all basic needs. The world is helping by donating food. And money. Life has always been tough in Haiti, except for the lucky few.
Corruption is a big issue in Haiti. In 2006 it was rated as [...]

There we go: “Drugs money worth billions of dollars kept the financial system afloat at the height of the global crisis, the United Nations’ drugs and crime tsar, Mr. Costa, has told the Observer.” Leave it to UNODC to help bloggers and the press to come up with interesting headlines.
The head of the UN Office [...]

Swiss authorities apparently opened a criminal investigation after being informed that a former HSBC employee took client data from HSBC Switzerland and provided these client details to French authorities. According to the French newspaper Le Parisien the files contain thousands of client records from the HSBC Private Banking Geneva. The bank did confirm that a [...]

‘Fort Lauderdale Attorney Charged in Billion-Dollar Ponzi Scheme’. This headline would probably have hit you harder in a pre-Madoff era. But even now this is quite an impressive allegation. The FBI and IRS seek to confiscate $1.2 billion, including (the usual) ferraris, roll’s royces, yachts, houses, jewelry, bank accounts in Morocco and Gibraltar and what [...]

According to the Italian weekly “Panorama” the Vatican bank is under investigation for money laundering. For all of you who think that is too absurd an allegation, take the time to browse the net (or your local bookstore) for Roberto Calvi a/k/a/ “God’s banker” and Banco Ambrosiano. In 1984, the Vatican Bank agreed to pay [...]

This week the FBI announced the indictment of 10 individuals charged with conspiring to export weapons from Philadelphia to the Port of Latakia, Syria. The suspects allegedly wanted to help Hizballah by providing them with 1,200 Colt M4 Carbines. Other suspects were also charged with conspiring to provide material support to Hizballah in the form [...]

Most countries ban some types of gambling. The type of gambling ‘games’ that are allowed are usually strictly regulated and mostly (semi) government owned. That does not mean that the odds are fair. In sports betting, game rigging is a real concern. And obviously, when you speak about big bucks, there will be big criminals [...]

A Pa. lawyer, Mr. Karoly, was convicted of fraud and money laundering.
Prosecutors claimed that the lawyer and his brothers faked a will to collect “a significant portion” of his brother’s and sister-in-law’s multi-million dollar estates after they were killed in a Feb. 2, 2007 plane crash.
Other than that, the U.S. District Judge said that 59-year-old [...]

A Chicago police sergeant who heads a local sergeants association has been arrested on charges he stole more than $600,000 from the organization.
Prosecutors allege he made withdrawals and wrote checks payable to himself on the association’s bank account. He allegedly laundered the proceeds to his personal credit card and bank accounts.
Authorities claim the CPD sergeant [...]