Wall Street Is Laundering Drug Money and Getting Away with It

[another saigon]

By Zach Carter, AlterNet

Posted on July 16, 2010, Printed on July 17, 2010

http://www.alternet.org/story/147564/


snip...


Bloomberg's Michael Smith has penned a devastating expose detailing Wachovia's drug-money operations and the government's twisted response. The bank was moving money behind literally tons of cocaine from violent drug cartels. It wasn't an accident. Internal whistleblowers at Wachovia warned that the bank was laundering drug money, higher-ups at the bank actively looked the other way in order to score bigger profits, and the U.S. government is about to let everyone involved get off scott free. The bank will not be indicted, because it is official government policy not to prosecute megabanks. From Smith's story:


snip....

This scenario is several steps beyond what most of us think about when we debate too-big-to-fail. The government isn't shielding Wachovia from losses on risky bets in the capital markets casinos— it's shielding the bank from the prosecution of outright criminal behavior. The drug money business did not pose risks to the financial system, and Wachovia wasn't losing money on it. Wachovia is simply being shielded from what ought to be the ordinary functioning of the justice system.

Think about what would happen if you or I were accused of laundering $380 billion in drug money. We could not simply settle the allegations out of court in exchange for an apology and a fine. We'd spend the rest of our lives in jail for financing a ruthless, bloody and illegal business. About 22,000 people have been killed in the Mexican drug trade since 2006, and the drug trade itself can't happen without extensive money laundering operations. Moving the money is one of the most difficult and critical elements of any criminal enterprise—without ways to convert crooked cash into seemingly innocuous funds, crooks simply can't operate. Wachovia was doing top-level dirty work for drug dealers.

On the streets of American cities, the mere possession of these drugs can land you with a multi-year prison sentence. But financing multi-billion-dollar drug empires? Don't do it again, pretty please.

[midnight]

1. K&R.

[pauldp]

2. K&R here's a direct link to the Bloomberg piece:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.html

[another saigon]

5. thank you!

Their brazenness implies confidence in the status quo. sigh, same as it ever was. :(

[Oceansaway]

3. K&R...n/t

[Uncle Joe]

4. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, another saigon.

[metapunditedgy]

6. K&R. n/t

[xchrom]

7. Recommend