Wachovia // Current TV

http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2011/05/too-big-to-do-time-fed-wrist-slap-for.html

Wachovia Bank aids thugs in Mexican drug wars by laundering money-$378 billion-which is over half of the entire US defense budget and yet no one was arrested.
The U.S. government won convictions against 23,506 drug traffickers nationwide during 2010, sending 96 percent of the offenders to prison, according to U.S. Sentencing Commission statistics.

Yet one of the biggest entities busted by the feds for involvement in drug trafficking last year received just a wrist-slap deal from federal prosecutors with nobody getting prison time.

During 2010, the U.S. government also won convictions against 806 persons involved in smaller-time drug-related money laundering, sending nearly 77 percent of those offenders to prison.

Yet when it came to a case involving billions of dollars in illegal drug profits, the federal government gave the same unusual wrist-slap to the same entity caught giving greed-blinded assistance to Mexican drug cartels by laundering billions of dollars in illegal profits for them.

So, what is this entity that federal prosecutors found worthy of big breaks for its laundering of billions of dollars, and for its blatant facilitating or tons of smuggled cocaine?

Meet Wachovia – once the nation’s sixth largest bank by assets and now a part of Wells Fargo Bank… a too-big-to-fail bank that for the feds is apparently too-big-to jail.

Wachovia recently completed what amounted to a year-long probation arising from a March 2010 settlement deal with federal prosecutors who were pursuing criminal proceedings against Wachovia for its facilitating of illegal money transfers from Mexico totaling $378-billion…a staggering sum greater than half of the Pentagon's annual budget, which included billions of dollars traced directly to violent Mexican drug cartels.

The record $160-million fine slapped on Wachovia under terms of that settlement deal included a $50-million assessment for failing to monitor cash used to ship into the US 22 tons of cocaine. (That fine amounted to less than two percent of Wachovia's profits during the prior year.)

Wells Fargo now owns Wachovia. Wells Fargo, federal prosecutors stress, was not involvement in the misdeeds that landed Wachovia in court, where it received a deferred prosecution deal.

More at the link.Wachovia Bank aids thugs in Mexican drug wars by laundering money-$378 billion-which... more

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Wells Fargo & Wachovia Laundered 400Billion in Cocaine Cartel Cash

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Too Big to Fail ...and too Big to Jail, Banksters Bailed-out by Drug Money!

This tops the cake they arrest citizens of this country on misdemeanor drug crimes and ruin their lives god forbid that you were to deal or use criminal money your talkin mandatory terms here...but the banks and govt's can use it to bail themselves out as if they were n't helping themselves all along this story how could it be frosted over and buried its so the perfect Mix Drug MOney Laundering Miami style Banksters its frickin Miami vice Bankster style!!!where's Crocket & Tubbs & all my gators)
here 's Yves to explain....
crossposted Via: Naked Capitalism
The article recounts how the DEA, the criminal division of the Internal Revenue Service and the US attorney’s office in southern Florida were taking a hard look at wire transfers out of Mexico and found that they wound up at the correspondent bank account of the casas at Wachovia were supervised by its Miami branch. From the Guardian:

“On numerous occasions,” say the court papers, “monies were deposited into a CDC by a drug-trafficking organization. Using false identities, the CDC then wired that money through its Wachovia correspondent bank accounts for the purchase of airplanes for drug-trafficking organizations.” The court settlement of 2010 would detail that “nearly $13m went through correspondent bank accounts at Wachovia for the purchase of aircraft to be used in the illegal narcotics trade. From these aircraft, more than 20,000kg of cocaine were seized.”

The story provides a great deal more detail about the money laundering operations and the investigation. It is an excellent job of reporting and I urge you to read it in full. It is very clear the US put a lot of resources into the investigation. So why did Wachovia get off so easy?

At the height of the 2008 banking crisis, Antonio Maria Costa, then head of the United Nations office on drugs and crime, said he had evidence to suggest the proceeds from drugs and crime were “the only liquid investment capital” available to banks on the brink of collapse. “Inter-bank loans were funded by money that originated from the drugs trade,” he said. “There were signs that some banks were rescued that way.”…
[Paul] Mazur [lead infiltrator of the Medellin drug operation] said that “a lot of the law enforcement people were disappointed to see a settlement” between the administration and Wachovia. “But I know there were external circumstances that worked to Wachovia’s benefit, not least that the US banking system was on the edge of collapse.”

I suspect you never imagined “too big to fail” and “too big to jail” were this intimately connected.
Email This BlogThis! Share to Twitter Share to Facebook Share to Google BuzzThis tops the cake they arrest citizens of this country on misdemeanor drug crimes and... more

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