Gov Brewer & Bush Crime Cartel
bush@bush.net Dick N. Balz
Wachovia admits at least $110 million laundered through its branches
US banks are playing a crucial role in the running of the Mexican drug
trade, allowing their facilities to be used to launder money in a drug war
that has taken the lives of more than 22,000 people in the past four years,
a new investigative report reveals.
According to a report from the August, 2010, issue of Bloomberg Markets
magazine, both Bank of America and Wachovia are implicated in drug-money
laundering schemes to purchase jets to smuggle drugs.
The report, by Michael Smith, chronicles the seizure of a DC-9 jet at a
Mexican airport in 2006 when it was discovered that it contained $100
million-worth of cocaine. Investigators found that drug smugglers had bought
the plane with money laundered through BofA and through Wachovia, which was
bought out by Wells Fargo in 2008.
Smith reports:
This was no isolated incident. Wachovia, it turns out, had made a habit of
helping move money for Mexican drug smugglers. Wells Fargo & Co., which
bought Wachovia in 2008, has admitted in court that its unit failed to
monitor and report suspected money laundering by narcotics traffickers --
including the cash used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons
of cocaine.
Bloomberg obtained a copy of an agreement (PDF) between prosecutors and
Wachovia, signed in March, in which the bank admitted it had not done enough
to watch for money-laundering schemes among some $378 billion it transferred
between its branches and Mexican currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007.
http://www.justice.gov/usao/fls/PressReleases/Attachments/100317-02.Statement.pdf
"The investigation has identified at least $110 million in drug proceeds
that were funneled through the [currency-exchange] accounts held at
Wachovia," the agreement states.
"Wachovia's blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international
cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations,"
Bloomberg quotes federal prosecutor Jeffrey Sloman.
Wachovia agreed to pay $160 million to settle the court case in exchange for
charges being dropped, a move Sloman described as "historic."
Bloomberg also reports that a former Wachovia executive in charge of
anti-money laundering operations "quit the bank in disgust" after managers
ignored his reports that drug money was being laundered through its
facilities.
"If you don't see the correlation between the money laundering by banks and
the 22,000 people killed in Mexico, you're missing the point," Woods said.
Bank of America and UK-based HSBC have been connected to money laundering
schemes, according to the Bloomberg report.
Drug traffickers used accounts at Bank of America in Oklahoma City to buy
three planes that carried 10 tons of cocaine, according to Mexican court
filings.
Federal agents caught people who work for Mexican cartels depositing
illicit funds in Bank of America accounts in Atlanta, Chicago and
Brownsville, Texas, from 2002 to 2009. Mexican drug dealers used shell
companies to open accounts at London-based HSBC Holdings Plc, Europe's
biggest bank by assets, an investigation by the Mexican Finance Ministry
found.
Drug-related violence has been spiraling out of control along the US-Mexican
border in recent years. Ciudad Juarez, across the river from El Paso, Texas,
has recorded 700 murders so far this year. Earlier this week, a "clash"
between rival drug gangs left 21 people dead.
The violence has even begun to permeate Mexican politics, with three
drug-related assassinations against government officials in just the past
two weeks. A mayor and city councilor were killed Wednesday evening. Hours
later, a deputy attorney general in Cihuahua state was killed. The recent
disappearance of a former presidential candidate has drawn speculation
linking the incident to the drug wars.
Before the US invaded Afghanistan, the poppy plant was almost completely
eradicated in that country. After the invasion Afghan poppy plants were/are
at a record levels.
It's not surprising since basically the same thing happened in Vietnam.
ROFLMAO They want us to think this has been going for only 4 years?? I'm
sure if the looked a bit closer at all them investor and trader fucks they
will find the 2.3 TRILLION that was vanished by the Pentagon and reported on
by Donald Rumsfeld the day before 9-11-01. Lets not forget about Ollie North
and his Iran-Contra-Panama drug cartel ran by poppy Bu$h or his father
Prescott Bu$h and his heroin ring?
And water is wet; snow is white; republicans suck; what's new here?
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