All Discussions Tagged 'Cartel' - 12160 Social Network2024-03-28T20:12:58Zhttps://12160.info/forum/topic/listForTag?tag=Cartel&feed=yes&xn_auth=noGraphic Video Warning…Cartel wars have erupted across Mexico, near the U.S. border.tag:12160.info,2022-08-13:2649739:Topic:22195072022-08-13T19:15:02.427ZParrhesiahttps://12160.info/profile/DianaLovell
<p>Mexican cartel hitmen execute four outside Little Caesars.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Cartel wars have erupted across Mexico, near the U.S, border.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7ze4q/mexico-cjng-siege-doble-r"><strong>Here’s an excellent piece explaining what’s happening…</strong></a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The western states of Jalisco and Guanajuato were under siege for around 10 hours after Mexican authorities busted up a meeting between several important leaders of factions of…</p>
<p>Mexican cartel hitmen execute four outside Little Caesars.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Cartel wars have erupted across Mexico, near the U.S, border.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7ze4q/mexico-cjng-siege-doble-r"><strong>Here’s an excellent piece explaining what’s happening…</strong></a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>The western states of Jalisco and Guanajuato were under siege for around 10 hours after Mexican authorities busted up a meeting between several important leaders of factions of the hyper violent Jalisco New Generation Cartel, or CJNG. The cities of Guadalajara, Irapuato, Celaya and Leon saw numerous cars and buses engulfed in flames to block off traffic arteries, while a reported 25 convenience stores were also set on fire.</p>
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10765255057?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10765255057?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></p>
<p><a href="https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/mexican-cartel-hitmen-execute-four-outside-little-caesars-raw/">Graphic Video Warning… Cartel executions outside Little Caesars… – CITIZEN FREE PRESS</a></p> Mexico: Vatican's Knights Templar Drug Cartel Made Recruits Eat Children's Hearts in Initiation Ritetag:12160.info,2014-03-22:2649739:Topic:14375202014-03-22T10:45:12.068Z14300https://12160.info/profile/14300
<h1>Mexico: Vatican's Knights Templar Drug Cartel Made Recruits Eat Children's Hearts in Initiation Rite</h1>
<ul class="byline">
<li class="reporter"><span>By</span> <a class="reporter-name" href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/reporters/umberto-bacchi">Umberto Bacchi</a> <span class="time-format">March 21, 2014…</span></li>
</ul>
<h1>Mexico: Vatican's Knights Templar Drug Cartel Made Recruits Eat Children's Hearts in Initiation Rite</h1>
<ul class="byline">
<li class="reporter"><span>By</span> <a class="reporter-name" href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/reporters/umberto-bacchi">Umberto Bacchi</a> <span class="time-format">March 21, 2014</span></li>
<li class="reporter"><span class="time-format"><a href="http://www.blacklistednews.com/Mexico%3A_Knights_Templar_Drug_Cartel_Made_Recruits_Eat_Children%E2%80%99s_Hearts_in_Initiation_Rite/33892/0/38/38/Y/M.html">http://www.blacklistednews.com/Mexico%3A_Knights_Templar_Drug_Cartel_Made_Recruits_Eat_Children%E2%80%99s_Hearts_in_Initiation_Rite/33892/0/38/38/Y/M.html</a></span></li>
</ul>
<div id="v_article" class="article-text normal-article"><div style="width: 660px; max-width: 660px; height: auto;" class="imageBox"><img style="max-width: 660px; height: auto;" class="imgPhoto full" title="Vigilantes in Michoacan state say they rescued children kidnapped for organ trafficking by the Knights Templar drug cartel" alt="Mexican Knights Templar Drug Cartel cannibalism Organ Trafficking Rite" src="http://d.ibtimes.co.uk/en/full/1369628/mexican-knights-templar-drug-cartel-cannibalism-organ-trafficking-rite.jpg?w=660&h=439&l=50&t=40" width="660" height="439"/><div class="caption"><span class="cap">Vigilantes in Michoacan state say they rescued children kidnapped for organ trafficking by the Knights Templar drug cartel</span><span class="credit">Reuters</span></div>
<img style="xg-p: absolute; background-color: #ffffff; display: none; top: 0px; left: 0px;" class="enlarge" src="http://g.ibtimes.co.uk/www/img/hope/shrink.png"/></div>
<p>New members of an infamous Mexican drug cartel were forced to eat children's hearts as part of a gruesome initiation rite, informers told authorities in the western state of Michoacan.</p>
<p>Officials investigating an organ trafficking ring allegedly run by the Knights Templar cartel said there is evidence the late gang boss Nazario Moreno demanded that recruits proved their loyalty through an act of cannibalism.</p>
<p>"At [an] initiation ceremony they used the organs, in this case the heart, and forced people going through this initiatory process to eat it," Alfredo Castillo, the federal government's envoy to Michoacan, told a local radio.</p>
<p>Castillo said detectives were told of the shocking practice by detained members of the gang.</p>
<p>"There are statements from some people who were present when Nazario Moreno (El Chayo) came and told others, either as initiation or as part of a ritual: 'Today we are going to eat a person's heart'," Castillo told Noticias MVS.</p>
<p>Authorities said they have reason to believe the hearts were mainly taken from local children who were kidnapped and had their organs harvested for trafficking purposes.</p>
<p>Moreno, known as El Chayo "The Rosary" or El Más Loco "The Craziest One", was shot dead by security forces earlier this month.</p>
<div style="width: 351px; max-width: 330px; height: auto;" class="imageRight"><div class="caption"><span class="cap">The fingerprints of Nazario Moreno are displayed on a screen during a news conference at Interior Ministry in Mexico City</span><span class="credit">Reuters</span></div>
<img style="xg-p: absolute; background-color: #ffffff; display: none; top: 0px; left: 0px;" class="enlarge" src="http://g.ibtimes.co.uk/www/img/hope/shrink.png"/></div>
<p>The 43-year-old was intercepted after a tip-off by locals as he was riding a mule near a mountainous wood hut he used as hideout, authorities said.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexico-family-members-teloloapan-bags-fm-la-529043" target="_blank">Moreno, who founded La Familia cartel before starting up the Knights Templar,</a> was first declared dead by the Mexican government in December 2010 after a shootout with federal police, even though no corpse was found.</p>
<p>Earlier this month, police arrested Manuel Plancarte Gaspar, another member of the <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexico-man-rapist-crucified-road-drug-cartel-383088" target="_blank">Knights Templar</a>, on organ trafficking charges.</p>
<p>Plancarte Gaspar, 34, the nephew of Enrique Plancarte Solis, a top Knights Templar leader, was detained as he was travelling in a stolen car carrying cash and crystal meth with an accomplice.</p>
<p>Michoacan state public safety secretary Carlos Castellanos Becerra said Plancarte Gaspar was part of an organ-trafficking ring targeting individuals with certain characteristics, and particularly children.</p>
<p>"We have several statements in open investigations that point to a network of several suspects who would identify people with certain characteristics, especially children, and kidnap them,' Becerra said.</p>
<p>This week the leader of <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexico-12-dead-military-clashes-vigilantes-michoacan-1432314" target="_blank">an armed vigilante group fighting the Knights Templar</a> claimed his men rescued several children who were being taken in a refrigerated van to a Pacific port, after they were kidnapped from a local school.</p>
<p>"They were inside a refrigerated box, tightly wrapped in blankets," José Manuel Mireles told local media. "They were all children from the same Mexico City school."</p>
<div class="fullArticle"><div class="label">Related</div>
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<li><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexico-drug-cartel-hitman-beheaded-dismembered-800-victims-1436191" target="_blank">Mexico Drug Cartel Hitman Beheaded and Dismembered 800 Victims</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexicotop-five-most-violent-drug-cartels-1434218" target="_blank">Mexico:Top Five Most Violent Drug Cartels</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/mexico-drug-cartel-war-killed-bodies-16-382991" target="_blank">Mexico Drug War: 'I am a Templar Knight' Scrawled on 16 Tortured Corpses {GRAPHIC IMAGES]</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/severed-heads-dumped-outside-church-mexicos-michoacan-province-1435671" target="_blank">Severed Heads Dumped Outside Church in Mexico's Michoacan Province</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
</div> CONFIRMED: The DEA Struck A Deal With Mexico's Most Notorious Drug Carteltag:12160.info,2014-01-14:2649739:Topic:13938712014-01-14T22:49:28.565Ztruthhttps://12160.info/profile/adap2k
<p><br></br><br></br><b>CONFIRMED: The DEA Struck A Deal With Mexico's Most Notorious Drug Cartel</b><br></br> Michael Kelley, provided by<br></br> | January 13, 2014 <br></br><a href="http://www.chron.com/technology/businessinsider/article/CONFIRMED-The-DEA-Struck-A-Deal-With-Mexico-s-5138855.php?cmpid=hpbn" target="_blank">chron</a><br></br>An investigation by El Universal has found that between the years 2000 and 2012, <b>the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the…</b></p>
<p><br/><br/><b>CONFIRMED: The DEA Struck A Deal With Mexico's Most Notorious Drug Cartel</b><br/> Michael Kelley, provided by<br/> | January 13, 2014 <br/><a href="http://www.chron.com/technology/businessinsider/article/CONFIRMED-The-DEA-Struck-A-Deal-With-Mexico-s-5138855.php?cmpid=hpbn" target="_blank">chron</a><br/>An investigation by El Universal has found that between the years 2000 and 2012, <b>the U.S. government had an arrangement with Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel that allowed the organization to smuggle billions of dollars of drugs in exchange for information on rival cartels.</b> <br/><br/><b>Sinaloa, led by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, supplies 80% of the drugs entering the Chicago area</b> and has a presence in cities across the U.S.<br/><br/>There have <b>long been allegations that Guzman, considered to be "the world’s most powerful drug trafficker," coordinates with American authorities</b>.<br/>...<br/>Then-Justice Department prosecutor Patrick Hearn told the Chicago court that, according to DEA special agent Steve Fraga, Castro "provided information leading to a 23-ton cocaine seizure, other seizures related to "various drug trafficking organizations," and that "El Mayo" Zambada wanted his son to cooperate with the U.S.<br/><br/><a href="http://www.sfgate.com/technology/businessinsider/article/CONFIRMED-The-DEA-Struck-A-Deal-With-Mexico-s-5138855.php" target="_blank">http://www.sfgate.com/technology/businessinsider/article/CONFIRMED-The-DEA-Struck-A-Deal-With-Mexico-s-5138855.php</a><br/><b>CONFIRMED: The DEA Struck A Deal With Mexico's Most Notorious Drug Cartel</b><br/> Michael Kelley, provided by<br/>Published 9:33 am, Monday, January 13, 2014 <br/>...<br/><br/>After being extradited to Chicago in February 2010, Zambada-Niebla argued that he was also "immune from arrest or prosecution" because he actively provided information to U.S. federal agents.<br/><br/><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 1.3em;"><b>Zambada-Niebla also alleged that Operation Fast and Furious was part of an agreement to finance and arm the cartel in exchange for information used to take down its rivals. (If true, that re-raises the issue regarding what Attorney General Eric Holder knew about the gun-running arrangements.)</b></span><br/><br/>A Mexican foreign service officer told Stratfor in April 2010 that the U.S. seemed to have sided with the Sinaloa cartel in an attempt to limit the violence in Mexico.<br/><br/>El Universal said that the coordination between the U.S. and Sinaloa peaked between 2006 and 2012, which is when drug cartels consolidated their grip on Mexico. The report ends by saying that it is unclear whether the arrangements continue. <br/><br/><b>The DEA declined to comment to El Universal</b>.<br/><br/><br/><a href="http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/13/report-the-dea-really-did-strike-a-deal-with-mexicos-most-notorious-deadly-drug-cartel/" target="_blank">http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/13/report-the-dea-really-did-strike-a-deal-with-mexicos-most-notorious-deadly-drug-cartel/</a><br/><b>Major Mexican Newspaper’s Investigation Makes Stunning Conclusion About the U.S. Gov’t and Notorious Sinaloa Cartel</b><br/><br/>An investigation by major Mexican newspaper El Universal has concluded that the United States government worked with the Sinaloa cartel from 2000 and 2012 as part of a divide and conquer strategy. <b>In exchange for intel on rival cartels, the U.S. government allegedly allowed the cartel to smuggle billions of dollars worth of drugs.</b><br/>...<br/>“<b>The DEA agents met with members of the cartel in Mexico</b> to obtain <b>information about their rivals</b> and simultaneously <b>built a network of informants</b> who sign drug cooperation agreements, subject to results, to <b>enable them to obtain future benefits, including cancellation of charges in the U.S</b>.,” the report adds.</p>
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</table> A NEW WORLD MONETARY SYSTEM to replace the soon to expire Federal Reserve Act Dec. 2013tag:12160.info,2013-12-13:2649739:Topic:13770572013-12-13T12:52:16.987Z14300https://12160.info/profile/14300
<div class="post-13937 post type-post status-publish format-standard hentry category-news category-videos" id="post-13937"><h1 class="entry-title">US Government Preparing for the End of the Federal Reserve Charter in 2013 and replacing it with a New World Monetary System! (aka One World Government)</h1>
<br></br>
<div class="entry-meta"><span class="meta-prep meta-prep-author">Posted on…</span></div>
</div>
<div id="post-13937" class="post-13937 post type-post status-publish format-standard hentry category-news category-videos"><h1 class="entry-title">US Government Preparing for the End of the Federal Reserve Charter in 2013 and replacing it with a New World Monetary System! (aka One World Government)</h1>
<br/>
<div class="entry-meta"><span class="meta-prep meta-prep-author">Posted on</span> <a title="2:15 pm" href="http://www.fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/big-brother-america-government-preparing-for-the-end-of-the-federal-reserve-charter-in-2013/13937" rel="bookmark"><span class="entry-date">April 19, 2012</span></a> <span class="meta-sep">by</span> <span class="author vcard"><a class="url fn n" title="View all posts by Admin" href="http://www.fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/author/administrator">Admin</a></span></div>
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<div class="entry-content"><p><a href="http://fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/31503850.FederalReserveBuildingDC-300x199.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-13938" title="31503850.FederalReserveBuildingDC-300x199" alt="" src="http://fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/31503850.FederalReserveBuildingDC-300x199.jpg" width="300" height="199"/></a></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>In December of 2013, the Federal Reserve Charter will expire.</strong></span></p>
<p>The monetary enslavement created by Woodrow Wilson and the Central Bankers will come to a close. In order for the Federal Reserve to retain control over the United States money supply, this charter will have to be resigned by Congress.</p>
<p>Yet, considering the public knowledge of how dangerous central banks are to a governmental system, it may pose a problem for the privately owned bank to reup their charter.</p>
<p>In the early 1900′s, the excuse for the bank’s creation was to balance the monetary issues of the day. However, once the Federal Reserve was into control, the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began.</p>
<p>It also consolidated the smaller banks into the hands of the larger mega-banks of the time; putting more and more power into the hands of a few bankers.</p>
<p>Would the American public today allow this to continue if they were given a choice?</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>At the end of 2013, this choice will be on the table for America to decide if the Central Bankers will continue to force the population to be as feudal serfs to a monetary system created simply for enslavement.</strong></span></p>
<p></p>
<p>Recently, developments in the realm of the monetary system and governmental control have surfaced.</p>
<p>The circumstances seem to be unrelated, however when the dots are connected, a picture begins to form. If the charter and control of the Federal Reserve is coming to a close, how would alternative means of ensuring control be put into place if the Congress did not reup the charter for the Fed?</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>It might look something like this:</strong></span></p>
<p><em><strong>12/31/2011 – NDAA signed by President Obama</strong></em><strong>.</strong></p>
<p>This legislation gives the President power to secretly arrest, detain American citizens without trial, and even kill them.</p>
<p><em><strong>Late 2011 – The Enemy Expatriation Act, or H.R. 3166</strong></em></p>
<p>If this bill were passed, it would strip US citizens of their citizenship, therefore allowing the government to treat them as terrorists.</p>
<p><em><strong>December 2011 – FEMA Camps activated.</strong></em></p>
<p>FEMA camps are designed to house millions of people. The official reason is for displaced populous due to an economic or financial crisis.</p>
<p><em><strong>10/2011 – ACTA Treaty signed by 22 countries globally.</strong></em></p>
<p>This treaty allows those countries the power to censor the internet in their country at the will of the governments. This treaty was effectively executed after the protests of SOPA and PIPA.</p>
<p><strong><em>11/2011 Para-militarization of local police</em></strong></p>
<p>The military training local police departments and giving them access to military grade weaponry, computer technology, and assistance of the National Guard when requested for population control.</p>
<p><em><strong>2009 and Before – Urban Warfare Drills</strong></em></p>
<p><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Training the US Military Services to detain American citizens, use force if necessary, and/or kill them.</span></strong></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>It appears the United States government is making preparations for civil unrest</strong></span>.</p>
<p> <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>Could a contributing reason be the coming end of the Federal Reserve Charter in 2013?</strong></span></p>
<p>If the charter ends, the monetary system will have to either be reinvented without the fractional reserve control of the central banking system, or the charter will have to be resigned for another determined amount of time.</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>And yet, there seems to be another answer looming on the horizon. The IMF and World Central Bank have been calling for a "WORLD MONETARY SYSTEM" where the Bancor will be the GLOBAL CURRENCY.</strong></span></p>
<p>This would take care of the individual countries’ differing monies. This would also appear to take care of the governmental debts all of these countries have incurred against the central banks of the world.</p>
<p>As fiat currencies all over the global are being imploded or abandoned, <strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">this control over the world’s money cloaks a dangerous agenda.</span></strong></p>
<p>With world currency, comes world governance. In the beginning of 2012, the United Nations, France, China and other countries have called for a One World Government. And considering the United States is slipping into a police state control, the answer of global governance could be the next step in the take over agenda.</p>
<p>Most of us rely on our money for everything. We do not know how to be self-sustaining in any capacity. Our dependence on the functionality of the system will be turned into the shackles that hold us down and permanently enslave us.</p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>This is when the System will use the Problem-Reaction-Solution formula to finally lock us down.</strong></span></p>
<p>1. They created the fractional fiat currency printed in debt.</p>
<p>2. They will expect us to decry a new monetary system as this one shows itself to be failing.</p>
<p>3. They will issue a global currency (with paper or RFID chip) to save the populous from total economic collapse.</p>
<p>A History of the US Banking system: Prior to centralized banking, each commercial bank issued their own notes. The first institution with responsibilities of a central bank in the U.S. was the <a title="First Bank of the United States" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Bank_of_the_United_States">First Bank of the United States</a>, chartered in 1791 by <a title="Alexander Hamilton" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Hamilton">Alexander Hamilton</a>. Its charter was not renewed in 1811. In 1816, the <a title="Second Bank of the United States" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Bank_of_the_United_States">Second Bank of the United States</a> was chartered; its charter was not renewed in 1836, after it became the object of a major attack by president <a title="Andrew Jackson" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Jackson">Andrew Jackson</a>. <span id="more-13937"></span>From 1837 to 1862, in the <a title="Free Banking Era" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Banking_Era">Free Banking Era</a> there was no formal central bank, and banks issued their own notes again. From 1862 to 1913, a system of national banks was instituted by the 1863 <a title="National Banking Act" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Banking_Act">National Banking Act</a>. The first printed notes were Series 1914. In 1928, cost-cutting measures were taken to reduce the note to the size it is today.</p>
<p>Today, the Federal Reserve prints the legal tender for the United States. It controls inflation of that currency, its worth and how much of it is in circulation at any given time. The currency is not backed by gold, silver or any other precious metal. It is fractionally created from the debt of the United States government to the privately owned and controlled Federal Reserve Bank. Each note printed by the central bank is worth roughly $ 0.80 cents (depending on the fluctuating currency rate). The debt mounts up as the federal no0tes are printed because as each is worth less, the value is lessend as well.</p>
<p>In the case, the debt cannot be repaid because the legal tender is never worth more than the debt.</p>
<p>In December of 2013, the Federal Reserve Charter will come to an end. The monetary enslavement created by Woodrow Wilson and the Central Bankers will come to a close. In order for the Federal Reserve to retain control over the United States money supply, this charter will have to be resigned by Congress. Yet, considering the public knowledge of how dangerous central banks are to a governmental system, it may pose a problem for the privately owned bank to reup their charter.</p>
<p>In the early 1900′s, the excuse for the bank’s creation was to balance the monetary issues of the day. However, once the Federal Reserve was into control, the stock market crashed and the Great Depression began. It also consolidated the smaller banks into the hands of the larger mega-banks of the time; putting more and more power into the hands of a few bankers.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/big-brother-america-government-preparing-for-the-end-of-the-federal-reserve-charter-in-2013/13937">http://www.fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/big-brother-america-government-preparing-for-the-end-of-the-federal-reserve-charter-in-2013/13937</a></p>
</div>
</div> JPM's on Drugs: Drugs 'readily available' at JP Morgantag:12160.info,2011-01-07:2649739:Topic:2854082011-01-07T20:51:46.328ZLocaltarianhttps://12160.info/profile/Awho
<h2>Drugs were “readily available” at global financial company JP Morgan, the Old Bailey has heard.</h2>
<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8245892/Drugs-readily-available-at-JP-Morgan.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8245892/Drugs-readily-available-at-JP-Morgan.html</a><br />
<div class="firstPar"><p> </p>
<p>Personal assistant Emily McMillan stole thousands of pounds from the company after getting into debt buying narcotics from a drug-dealing colleague.…</p>
</div>
<h2>Drugs were “readily available” at global financial company JP Morgan, the Old Bailey has heard.</h2>
<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8245892/Drugs-readily-available-at-JP-Morgan.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/8245892/Drugs-readily-available-at-JP-Morgan.html</a><br />
<div class="firstPar"><p> </p>
<p>Personal assistant Emily McMillan stole thousands of pounds from the company after getting into debt buying narcotics from a drug-dealing colleague.</p>
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<div class="secondPar"><p>McMillan, 28, used corporate credit cards belonging to senior executives to steal the money.</p>
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<div class="thirdPar"><p>She then spent it on a friend’s breast enhancement operation, a girls’ holiday in Ibiza and to make a repayment on her brother’s mortgage.</p>
</div>
<div class="fourthPar"><p>The Old Bailey heard that she began stealing after she fell into debt through taking drugs supplied by a colleague at JP Morgan. She had access to corporate credit cards to make travel and other arrangements on behalf of senior staff. But she was caught after a routine audit and later admitted four counts of fraud and one of theft, totalling £10,633, all committed between March and May last year.</p>
</div>
<div class="fifthPar"><p>Judge Brian Barker, the Common Serjeant of London, said that the “breach of trust” would normally result in jail but that he would make a “rare” exception.</p>
</div> Banks Financing Mexico Gangs Admitted in Wells Fargo Dealtag:12160.info,2010-07-17:2649739:Topic:2124152010-07-17T19:22:29.978ZLocaltarianhttps://12160.info/profile/Awho
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.html">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.html</a><p><br></br></p>
<p>Just before sunset on April 10, 2006, a DC-9 jet landed at the international airport in the port city of Ciudad del Carmen, 500 miles east of Mexico City. As
soldiers on the ground approached the plane, the crew tried to<br />
shoo them…</p>
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.html">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-29/banks-financing-mexico-s-drug-cartels-admitted-in-wells-fargo-s-u-s-deal.html</a><p><br/></p>
<p>Just before sunset on April 10, 2006, a DC-9 jet landed at the international airport in the port
city of Ciudad del Carmen, 500 miles east of Mexico City. As<br />
soldiers on the ground approached the plane, the crew tried to<br />
shoo them away, saying there was a dangerous oil leak. So the<br />
troops grew suspicious and searched the jet.</p>
<p>They found 128 black suitcases, packed with 5.7 tons of cocaine, valued at $100 million. The stash was supposed to have
been delivered from Caracas to drug traffickers in Toluca, near<br />
Mexico City, Mexican prosecutors later found. Law enforcement<br />
officials also discovered something else.</p>
<p>The smugglers had bought the DC-9 with laundered funds they transferred through two of the biggest banks in the U.S.:
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=WB:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Wachovia Corp.</a> and <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=BAC:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Bank of America Corp.</a>, Bloomberg Markets<br />
magazine reports in its August 2010 issue.</p>
<p>This was no isolated incident. Wachovia, it turns out, had made a habit of helping move money for Mexican drug smugglers.
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=WFC:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Wells Fargo & Co.</a>, which bought Wachovia in 2008, has admitted<br />
in court that its unit failed to monitor and report suspected<br />
money laundering by narcotics traffickers -- including the cash<br />
used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons of<br />
cocaine.</p>
<p>The admission came in an agreement that Charlotte, North Carolina-based Wachovia struck with federal prosecutors in
March, and it sheds light on the largely undocumented role of<br />
U.S. banks in contributing to the violent drug trade that has<br />
convulsed Mexico for the past four years.</p>
<p>‘Blatant Disregard’</p>
<p>Wachovia admitted it didn’t do enough to spot illicit funds in handling <a href="http://www.justice.gov/usao/fls/PressReleases/Attachments/100317-02.Statement.pdf" title="Open Web Site">$378.4 billion</a> for Mexican-currency-exchange houses
from 2004 to 2007. That’s the largest violation of the Bank<br />
Secrecy Act, an anti-money-laundering law, in U.S. history -- a<br />
sum equal to one-third of Mexico’s current <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=MXGCTOT:IND" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">gross domestic<br />
product</a>.</p>
<p>“Wachovia’s blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance
their operations,” says <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Jeffrey%20Sloman&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Jeffrey Sloman</a>, the federal prosecutor<br />
who handled the case.</p>
<p>Since 2006, more than 22,000 people have been killed in drug-related battles that have raged mostly along the 2,000-mile
(3,200-kilometer) border that Mexico shares with the U.S. In the<br />
Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El<br />
Paso, Texas, 700 people had been murdered this year as of mid-<br />
June. Six Juarez police officers were slaughtered by automatic<br />
weapons fire in a midday ambush in April.</p>
<p>Rondolfo Torre, the leading candidate for governor in the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas, was gunned down yesterday,
less than a week before elections in which violence related to<br />
drug trafficking was a central issue.</p>
<p>45,000 Troops</p>
<p>Mexican President <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Felipe%20Calderon&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Felipe Calderon</a> vowed to crush the drug cartels when he took office in December 2006, and he’s since
deployed 45,000 troops to fight the cartels. They’ve had little<br />
success.</p>
<p>Among the dead are police, soldiers, journalists and ordinary citizens. The U.S. has pledged Mexico $1.1 billion in
the past two years to aid in the fight against narcotics<br />
cartels.</p>
<p>In May, President <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Barack%20Obama&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Barack Obama</a> said he’d send 1,200 National Guard troops, adding to the 17,400 agents on the U.S.
side of the border to help stem drug traffic and illegal<br />
immigration.</p>
<p>Behind the carnage in Mexico is an industry that supplies hundreds of tons of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and
methamphetamines to Americans. The cartels have built a network<br />
of dealers in 231 U.S. cities from coast to coast, taking in<br />
about $39 billion in sales annually, according to the Justice<br />
Department.</p>
<p>‘You’re Missing the Point’</p>
<p>Twenty million people in the U.S. regularly use illegal drugs, spurring street crime and wrecking families. Narcotics
cost the U.S. economy <a href="http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs38/38661/index.htm" title="Open Web Site">$215 billion</a> a year -- enough to cover<br />
health care for 30.9 million Americans -- in overburdened<br />
courts, prisons and hospitals and lost productivity, the<br />
department says.</p>
<p>“It’s the banks laundering money for the cartels that finances the tragedy,” says Martin Woods, director of Wachovia’s
anti-money-laundering unit in London from 2006 to 2009. Woods<br />
says he quit the bank in disgust after executives ignored his<br />
documentation that drug dealers were funneling money through<br />
Wachovia’s branch network.</p>
<p>“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 says.</p>
<p>Cleansing Dirty Cash</p>
<p>Wachovia is just one of the U.S. and European banks that have been used for drug money laundering. For the past two
decades, Latin American drug traffickers have gone to U.S. banks<br />
to cleanse their dirty cash, says Paul Campo, head of the U.S.<br />
Drug Enforcement Administration’s financial crimes unit.</p>
<p>Miami-based American Express Bank International <a href="http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/american-express-bank-international-enters-into-deferred-prosecution-agreement-and-forfeits-55-million-to-resolve-bank-secrecy-act-violations-57904267.html" title="Open Web Site">paid fines</a> in both 1994 and 2007 after admitting it had failed to spot and
report drug dealers laundering money through its accounts. Drug<br />
traffickers used accounts at <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=BAC:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Bank of America</a> in Oklahoma City to<br />
buy three planes that carried 10 tons of cocaine, according to<br />
Mexican court filings.</p>
<p>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.<br />
Mexican drug dealers used shell companies to open accounts at<br />
London-based <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=HSBA:LN" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">HSBC Holdings Plc</a>, Europe’s biggest bank by assets,<br />
an investigation by the Mexican Finance Ministry found.</p>
<p>Following Rules</p>
<p>Those two banks weren’t accused of wrongdoing. Bank of America spokeswoman <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Shirley%20Norton&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Shirley Norton</a> and HSBC spokesman Roy Caple
say laws bar them from discussing specific clients. They say<br />
their banks strictly follow the government rules.</p>
<p>“Bank of America takes its anti-money-laundering responsibilities very seriously,” Norton says.</p>
<p>A Mexican judge on Jan. 22 accused the owners of six centros cambiarios, or money changers, in Culiacan and Tijuana
of laundering drug funds through their accounts at the Mexican<br />
units of <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=SAN:SM" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Banco Santander SA</a>, <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=C:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Citigroup Inc.</a> and HSBC, according<br />
to court documents filed in the case.</p>
<p>The money changers are in jail while being tried. Citigroup, HSBC and Santander, which is the largest Spanish bank
by assets, weren’t accused of any wrongdoing. The three banks<br />
say Mexican law bars them from commenting on the case, adding<br />
that they each carefully enforce anti-money-laundering programs.</p>
<p>HSBC has stopped accepting dollar deposits in Mexico, and Citigroup no longer allows noncustomers to change dollars there.
Citigroup detected suspicious activity in the Tijuana accounts,<br />
reported it to regulators and closed the accounts, Citigroup<br />
spokesman <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Paulo%20Carreno&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Paulo Carreno</a> says.</p>
<p>Criminal Empires</p>
<p>On June 15, the <a href="http://www.shcp.gob.mx/SALAPRENSA/doc_comunicados_prensa/2010/junio/comunicado_041_2010.pdf" title="Open Web Site">Mexican Finance Ministry</a> announced it would set limits for banks on cash deposits in dollars.</p>
<p>Mexico’s drug cartels have become multinational criminal enterprises.</p>
<p>Some of the gangs have delved into other illegal activities such as gunrunning, kidnapping and smuggling people across the
border, as well as into seemingly legitimate areas such as<br />
trucking, travel services and air cargo transport, according to<br />
the Justice Department’s <a href="http://www.justice.gov/ndic/" title="Open Web Site">National Drug Intelligence Center</a>.</p>
<p>These criminal empires have no choice but to use the global banking system to finance their businesses, Mexican Senator
Felipe Gonzalez says.</p>
<p>“With so much cash, the only way to move this money is through the banks,” says Gonzalez, who represents a central
Mexican state and chairs the senate public safety committee.</p>
<p>Gonzalez, a member of Calderon’s National Action Party, carries a .38 revolver for personal protection.</p>
<p>“I know this won’t stop the narcos when they come through that door with machine guns,” he says, pointing to the entrance
to his office. “But at least I’ll take one with me.”</p>
<p>Subprime Losses</p>
<p>No bank has been more closely connected with Mexican money laundering than Wachovia. Founded in 1879, Wachovia became the
largest bank by assets in the southeastern U.S. by 1900. After<br />
the Great Depression, some people in North Carolina called the<br />
bank “Walk-Over-Ya” because it had foreclosed on farms in the<br />
region.</p>
<p>By 2008, Wachovia was the sixth-largest U.S. lender, and it faced $26 billion in losses from subprime mortgage loans.
That cost Wachovia Chief Executive Officer <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Kennedy%20Thompson&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Kennedy Thompson</a> his<br />
job in June 2008.</p>
<p>Six months later, San Francisco-based Wells Fargo, which dates from 1852, bought Wachovia for $12.7 billion, creating the
largest network of bank branches in the U.S. Thompson, who now<br />
works for private-equity firm Aquiline Capital Partners LLC in<br />
New York, declined to comment.</p>
<p>As Wachovia’s balance sheet was bleeding, its legal woes were mounting. In the three years leading up to Wachovia’s
agreement with the Justice Department, grand juries served the<br />
bank with <a href="http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/ea/files/100316095447.pdf" title="Open Web Site">6,700 subpoenas</a> requesting information.</p>
<p>Not Quick Enough</p>
<p>The bank didn’t react quickly enough to the prosecutors’ requests and failed to hire enough investigators, the U.S.
Treasury Department said in March. After a 22-month<br />
investigation, the Justice <a href="http://www.justice.gov/usao/fls/PressReleases/100317-02.html" title="Open Web Site">Department on March 12</a> charged<br />
Wachovia with violating the Bank Secrecy Act by failing to run<br />
an effective anti-money-laundering program.</p>
<p>Five days later, Wells Fargo promised in a Miami federal courtroom to revamp its detection systems. Wachovia’s new owner
paid $160 million in fines and penalties, less than 2 percent of<br />
its $12.3 billion profit in 2009.</p>
<p>If Wells Fargo keeps its pledge, the U.S. government will, according to the agreement, drop all charges against the bank in
March 2011.</p>
<p>Wells Fargo regrets that some of Wachovia’s former anti- money-laundering efforts fell short, spokeswoman <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Mary%20Eshet&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Mary Eshet</a>
says. Wells Fargo has invested $42 million in the past three<br />
years to improve its anti-money-laundering program and has been<br />
working with regulators, she says.</p>
<p>‘Significantly Upgraded’</p>
<p>“We have substantially increased the caliber and number of staff in our international investigations group, and we also
significantly upgraded the monitoring software,” Eshet says. The<br />
agreement bars the bank from contesting or contradicting the<br />
facts in its admission.</p>
<p>The bank declined to answer specific questions, including how much it made by handling $378.4 billion -- including $4
billion of cash-from Mexican exchange companies.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.occ.treas.gov/bsa/bsaregs.htm" title="Open Web Site">1970 Bank Secrecy Act</a> requires banks to report all cash transactions above $10,000 to regulators and to tell the
government about other suspected money-laundering activity. Big<br />
banks employ hundreds of investigators and spend millions of<br />
dollars on software programs to scour accounts.</p>
<p>No big U.S. bank -- Wells Fargo included -- has ever been indicted for violating the Bank Secrecy Act or any other federal
law. Instead, the Justice Department settles criminal charges by<br />
using <a href="http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/ea/files/100316095447.pdf" title="Open Web Site">deferred-prosecution agreements</a>, in which a bank pays a<br />
fine and promises not to break the law again.</p>
<p>‘No Capacity to Regulate’</p>
<p>Large banks are protected from indictments by a variant of the too-big-to-fail theory.</p>
<p>Indicting a big bank could trigger a mad dash by investors to dump shares and cause panic in financial markets, says Jack
Blum, a U.S. Senate investigator for 14 years and a consultant<br />
to international banks and brokerage firms on money laundering.</p>
<p>The theory is like a get-out-of-jail-free card for big banks, Blum says.</p>
<p>“There’s no capacity to regulate or punish them because they’re too big to be threatened with failure,” Blum says. “They
seem to be willing to do anything that improves their bottom<br />
line, until they’re caught.”</p>
<p>Wachovia’s run-in with federal prosecutors hasn’t troubled investors. <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=WFC:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Wells Fargo’s stock</a> traded at $30.86 on March 24, up 1 percent
in the week after the March 17 agreement was announced.</p>
<p>Moving money is central to the drug trade -- from the cash that people tape to their bodies as they cross the U.S.-Mexican
border to the $100,000 wire transfers they send from Mexican<br />
exchange houses to big U.S. banks.</p>
<p>‘Doesn’t Stop Anyone’</p>
<p>In Tijuana, 15 miles south of San Diego, Gustavo Rojas has lived for a quarter of a century in a shack in the shadow of the
10-foot-high (3-meter-high) steel border fence that separates<br />
the U.S. and Mexico there. He points to holes burrowed under the<br />
barrier.</p>
<p>“They go across with drugs and come back with cash,” Rojas, 75, says. “This fence doesn’t stop anyone.”</p>
<p>Drug money moves back and forth across the border in an endless cycle. In the U.S., couriers take the cash from drug
sales to Mexico -- as much as <a href="http://www.ice.gov/partners/financial/cps-study/" title="Open Web Site">$29 billion a year</a>, according to<br />
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. That would be about<br />
319 tons of $100 bills.</p>
<p>They hide it in cars and trucks to smuggle into Mexico. There, cartels pay people to deposit some of the cash into
Mexican banks and branches of international banks. The narcos<br />
launder much of what’s left through money changers.</p>
<p>The Money Changers</p>
<p>Anyone who has been to Mexico is familiar with these street-corner money changers; Mexican regulators say there are
at least 3,000 of them from Tijuana to Cancun, usually<br />
displaying large signs advertising the day’s dollar-peso<br />
exchange rate.</p>
<p>Mexican banks are regulated by the <a href="http://www.cnbv.gob.mx/" title="Open Web Site">National Banking and Securities Commission</a>, which has an anti-money-laundering unit;
the money changers are policed by Mexico’s Tax Service<br />
Administration, which has no such unit.</p>
<p>By law, the money changers have to demand identification from anyone exchanging more than $500. They also have to report
transactions higher than $5,000 to regulators.</p>
<p>The cartels get around these requirements by employing legions of individuals -- including relatives, maids and
gardeners -- to convert small amounts of dollars into pesos or<br />
to make deposits in local banks. After that, cartels wire the<br />
money to a multinational bank.</p>
<p>The Smurfs</p>
<p>The people making the small money exchanges are known as Smurfs, after the cartoon characters.</p>
<p>“They can use an army of people like Smurfs and go through $1 million before lunchtime,” says Jerry Robinette, who oversees
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations along the<br />
border in east Texas.</p>
<p>The U.S. Treasury has been warning banks about big Mexican- currency-exchange firms laundering drug money since 1996.
By 2004, many U.S. banks had closed their accounts with these<br />
companies, which are known as casas de cambio.</p>
<p>Wachovia ignored warnings by regulators and police, according to the deferred-prosecution agreement.</p>
<p>“As early as 2004, Wachovia understood the risk,” the bank admitted in court. “Despite these warnings, Wachovia remained in
the business.”</p>
<p>One customer that Wachovia took on in 2004 was Casa de Cambio Puebla SA, a Puebla, Mexico-based currency-exchange
company. Pedro Alatorre, who ran a Puebla branch in Mexico City,<br />
had created front companies for cartels, according to a pending<br />
Mexican criminal case against him.</p>
<p>Federal Indictment</p>
<p>A federal grand jury in Miami indicted Puebla, Alatorre and three other executives in February 2008 for drug trafficking and
money laundering. In May 2008, the Justice Department sought<br />
extradition of the suspects, saying they used shell firms to<br />
launder $720 million through U.S. banks.</p>
<p>Alatorre has been in a Mexican jail for 2 1/2 years. He denies any wrongdoing, his lawyer Mauricio Moreno says. Alatorre
has made no court-filed responses in the U.S.</p>
<p>During the period in which Wachovia admitted to moving money out of Mexico for Puebla, couriers carrying clear plastic
bags stuffed with cash went to the branch Alatorre ran at the<br />
Mexico City airport, according to surveillance reports by<br />
Mexican police.</p>
<p>Alatorre opened accounts at HSBC on behalf of front companies, Mexican investigators found.</p>
<p>Puebla executives used the stolen identities of 74 people to launder money through Wachovia accounts, Mexican prosecutors
say in court-filed reports.</p>
<p>‘Never Reported’</p>
<p>“Wachovia handled all the transfers, and they never reported any as suspicious,” says Jose Luis Marmolejo, a former
head of the Mexican attorney general’s financial crimes unit who<br />
is now in private practice.</p>
<p>In November 2005 and January 2006, Wachovia transferred a total of $300,000 from Puebla to a Bank of America account in
Oklahoma City, according to information in the Alatorre cases in<br />
the U.S. and Mexico.</p>
<p>Drug smugglers used the funds to buy the DC-9 through Oklahoma City aircraft broker U.S. Aircraft Titles Inc.,
according to financial records cited in the Mexican criminal<br />
case. U.S. Aircraft Titles President Sue White declined to<br />
comment.</p>
<p>On April 5, 2006, a pilot flew the plane from St. Petersburg, Florida, to Caracas to pick up the cocaine,
according to the DEA. Five days later, troops seized the plane<br />
in Ciudad del Carmen and burned the drugs at a nearby army base.</p>
<p>‘Wachovia Knew’</p>
<p>“I am sure Wachovia knew what was going on,” says Marmolejo, who oversaw the criminal investigation into
Wachovia’s customers. “It went on too long and they made too<br />
much money not to have known.”</p>
<p>At Wachovia’s anti-money-laundering unit in London, Woods and his colleague Jim DeFazio, in Charlotte, say they suspected
that drug dealers were using the bank to move funds.</p>
<p>Woods, a former Scotland Yard investigator, spotted illegible signatures and other suspicious markings on traveler’s
checks from Mexican exchange companies, he said in a September<br />
2008 letter to the U.K. <a href="http://www.fsa.gov.uk/" title="Open Web Site">Financial Services Authority</a>. He sent<br />
copies of the letter to the DEA and Treasury Department in the<br />
U.S.</p>
<p>Woods, 45, says his bosses instructed him to keep quiet and tried to have him fired, according to his letter to the FSA. In
one meeting, a bank official insisted Woods shouldn’t have filed<br />
suspicious activity reports to the government, as both U.S. and<br />
U.K. laws require.</p>
<p>‘I Was Shocked’</p>
<p>“I was shocked by the content and outcome of the meeting and genuinely traumatized,” Woods wrote.</p>
<p>In the U.S., DeFazio, who had been a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent for 21 years, says he told bank executives
in 2005 that the DEA was probing the transfers through Wachovia<br />
to buy the planes.</p>
<p>Bank executives spurned recommendations to close suspicious accounts, DeFazio, 63, says.</p>
<p>“I think they looked at the money and said, ‘The hell with it. We’re going to bring it in, and look at all the money we’ll
make,’” DeFazio says.</p>
<p>DeFazio retired in 2008.</p>
<p>“I didn’t want anything from them,” he says. “I just wanted to get out.”</p>
<p>Woods, who resigned from Wachovia in May 2009, now advises banks on how to combat money laundering. He declined to discuss
details of Wachovia’s actions.</p>
<p>U.S. Comptroller of the Currency <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=John%20Dugan&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">John Dugan</a> told Woods in a March 19 letter his efforts had helped the U.S. build its case
against Wachovia.</p>
<p>‘Great Courage’</p>
<p>“You demonstrated great courage and integrity by speaking up when you saw problems,” Dugan wrote.</p>
<p>It was the Puebla investigation that led U.S. authorities to the broader probe of Wachovia. On May 16, 2007, DEA agents
conducted a raid of Wachovia’s international banking offices in<br />
Miami. They had a court order to seize Puebla’s accounts.</p>
<p>U.S. prosecutors and investigators then scrutinized the bank’s dealings with Mexican-currency-exchange firms. That led
to the March deferred-prosecution agreement.</p>
<p>With Puebla’s Wachovia accounts seized, Alatorre and his partners shifted their laundering scheme to HSBC, according to
financial documents cited in the Mexican criminal case against<br />
Alatorre.</p>
<p>In the three weeks after the DEA raided Wachovia, two of Alatorre’s front companies, Grupo ETPB SA and Grupo Rahero SC,
made 12 cash deposits totaling $1 million at an HSBC Mexican<br />
branch, Mexican investigators found.</p>
<p>Another Drug Plane</p>
<p>The funds financed a Beechcraft King Air 200 plane that police seized on Dec. 29, 2007, in Cuernavaca, 50 miles south of
Mexico City, according to information in the case against<br />
Alatorre.</p>
<p>For years, federal authorities watched as the wife and daughter of Oscar Oropeza, a drug smuggler working for the
Matamoros-based Gulf Cartel, deposited stacks of cash at a Bank<br />
of America branch on Boca Chica Boulevard in Brownsville, Texas,<br />
less than 3 miles from the border.</p>
<p>Investigator Robinette sits in his pickup truck across the street from that branch. It’s a one-story, tan stucco building
next to a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet. Robinette discusses the<br />
Oropeza case with Tom Salazar, an agent who investigated the<br />
family.</p>
<p>“Everybody in there knew who they were -- the tellers, everyone,” Salazar says. “The bank never came to us, though.”</p>
<p>New Meaning</p>
<p>The Oropeza case gives a new, literal meaning to the term money laundering. Oropeza’s wife, Tina Marie, and daughter
Paulina Marie deposited stashes of $20 bills several times a day<br />
into Bank of America accounts, Salazar says. Bank employees got<br />
to know the Oropezas by the smell of their money.</p>
<p>“I asked the tellers what they were talking about, and they said the money had this sweet smell like Bounce, those sheets
you throw into the dryer,” Salazar says. “They told me that when<br />
they opened the vault, the smell of Bounce just poured out.”</p>
<p>Oropeza, 48, was arrested 820 miles from Brownsville. On May 31, 2007, police in Saraland, Alabama, stopped him on a
traffic violation. Checking his record, they learned of the<br />
investigation in Texas.</p>
<p>They searched the van and discovered 84 kilograms (185 pounds) of cocaine hidden under a false floor. That allowed
federal agents to freeze Oropeza’s bank accounts and search his<br />
marble-floored home in Brownsville, Robinette says. Inside,<br />
investigators found a supply of Bounce alongside the clothes<br />
dryer.</p>
<p>Guilty Pleas</p>
<p>All three Oropezas pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Brownsville to drug and money-laundering charges in March and
April 2008. Oscar Oropeza was sentenced to 15 years in prison;<br />
his wife was ordered to serve 10 months and his daughter got 6<br />
months.</p>
<p>Bank of America’s Norton says, “We not only fulfilled our regulatory obligation, but we proactively worked with law
enforcement on these matters.”</p>
<p>Prosecutors have tried to halt money laundering at American Express Bank International twice. In 1994, the bank, then a
subsidiary of New York-based <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=AXP:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">American Express Co.</a>, pledged not<br />
to allow money laundering again after two employees were<br />
convicted in a criminal case involving drug trafficker Juan<br />
Garcia Abrego.</p>
<p>In 1994, the bank paid $14 million to settle. Five years later, drug money again flowed through American
Express Bank. Between 1999 and 2004, the bank failed to stop<br />
clients from laundering $55 million of narcotics funds, the bank<br />
admitted in a deferred-prosecution agreement in August 2007.</p>
<p>Western Union</p>
<p>It paid $65 million to the U.S. and promised not to break the law again. The government dismissed the criminal charge a
year later. American Express sold the bank to London-based<br />
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=STAN:LN" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Standard Chartered PLC</a> in February 2008 for $823 million.</p>
<p>Banks aren’t the only financial institutions that have turned a blind eye to drug cartels in moving illicit funds.
<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=WU:US" class="web_ticker" title="Get Quote">Western Union Co.</a>, the world’s largest money transfer firm,<br />
agreed to pay <a href="http://ir.westernunion.com/press/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=444559" title="Open Web Site">$94 million</a> in February 2010 to settle civil and<br />
criminal investigations by the Arizona attorney general’s<br />
office.</p>
<p>Undercover state police posing as drug dealers bribed Western Union employees to illegally transfer money, says
Cameron Holmes, an assistant attorney general.</p>
<p>“Their allegiance was to the smugglers,” Holmes says. “What they thought about during work was ‘How may I please my highest-
spending customers the most?’”</p>
<p>Smudged Fingerprints</p>
<p>Workers in more than 20 Western Union offices allowed the customers to use multiple names, pass fictitious identifications
and smudge their fingerprints on documents, investigators say in<br />
court records.</p>
<p>“In all the time we did undercover operations, we never once had a bribe turned down,” says Holmes, citing court
affidavits.</p>
<p>Western Union has made significant improvements, it complies with anti-money-laundering laws and works closely with
regulators and police, spokesman <a href="http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Tom%20Fitzgerald&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&lr=-lang_ja" title="Search News">Tom Fitzgerald</a> says.</p>
<p>For four years, Mexican authorities have been fighting a losing battle against the cartels. The police are often two
steps behind the criminals. Near the southeastern corner of<br />
Texas, in Matamoros, more than 50 combat troops surround a<br />
police station.</p>
<p>Officers take two suspected drug traffickers inside for questioning. Nearby, two young men wearing white T-shirts and
baggy pants watch and whisper into radios. These are los<br />
halcones (the falcons), whose job is to let the cartel bosses<br />
know what the police are doing.</p>
<p>‘Only Way’</p>
<p>While the police are outmaneuvered and outgunned, ordinary Mexicans live in fear. Rojas, the man who lives in the Tijuana
slum near the border fence, recalls cowering in his home as<br />
smugglers shot it out with the police.</p>
<p>“The only way to survive is to stay out of the way and hope the violence, the bullets, don’t come for you,” Rojas says.</p>
<p>To make their criminal enterprises work, the drug cartels of Mexico need to move billions of dollars across borders.
That’s how they finance the purchase of drugs, planes, weapons<br />
and safe houses, Senator Gonzalez says.</p>
<p>“They are multinational businesses, after all,” says Gonzalez, as he slowly loads his revolver at his desk in his
Mexico City office. “And they cannot work without a bank.”</p> Officer Jack McLamb encourages CALL TO ARMS - AZ County Invasiontag:12160.info,2010-06-24:2649739:Topic:2013102010-06-24T00:44:44.005ZWilson & Wilsonhttps://12160.info/profile/WilsonWilson
Officer Jack McLamb is encouraging everyone who can to take their arms and head to a Southern AZ County (can't pronounce or spell name). The Sheriff is begging for help as the invasion has become extreme. The phone # of that Sheriff is 520-866-6800. The people there are under violent attack. After 9 pm Mountain Time, go on GCN ans Listen to this evening's broadcast ON DEMAND the Officer Jack McLamb Program to hear all of it for yourself. Officer McLamb reminds us that these American Citizens…
Officer Jack McLamb is encouraging everyone who can to take their arms and head to a Southern AZ County (can't pronounce or spell name). The Sheriff is begging for help as the invasion has become extreme. The phone # of that Sheriff is 520-866-6800. The people there are under violent attack. After 9 pm Mountain Time, go on GCN ans Listen to this evening's broadcast ON DEMAND the Officer Jack McLamb Program to hear all of it for yourself. Officer McLamb reminds us that these American Citizens who are being murdered, raped, robbed and invaded are our neighbors and that we must not turn our heads away as they are under seige, but instead, we must assist our neighbors and their Sheriff.