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Where are the criminal convictions for HSBC and Wachovia's money laundering for the Mexican drug cartels? They laundered over $300 Billion USD over the years,

Where are the criminal convictions for HSBC and Wachovia's money laundering for the Mexican drug cartels? They laundered over $300 Billion USD over the years, and no one went to jail?

hurin 12y ago
Because criminal convictions against a major bank could have serious repercussions, probably both in terms of international relations and economically. In the same spirit - Silkroad the great online evil of the drug trade, had a yearly turnover of less than .1% of the world drug market.
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  Not as serious as sending them the message that they can continue uninhibited.
- epscylonb 12y ago
  If you owe me 100 dollars you have a problem, if you owe me a million dollars I have problem.
api 12y ago
Laws are for little people.
- hfx902 12y ago
  "Little people" may take offence to that. The correct saying would be "Laws are for poor people"
  - forrestthewoods 12y ago
    "Little people" are free to be offended when that term is used with respect to them. However they don't get to ban the word 'little' from the english language. The way it was used was perfectly fine and correct.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
stevedekorte 12y ago
Or for Standard Chartered, ING, Credit Suisse, RBS, Llyods Banking Group and Barclays?
shalbert 12y ago
Unfortunately the answer is simple: "Too big to fail" I wish things were better justified than that, but they seemingly are not.
rayiner 12y ago
To get a criminal conviction, you have to show requisite intent beyond a reasonable doubt. The basis of the HSBC indictment was failure to classify Mexican operations as "high risk" and follow the higher standard for suspicious activity reporting. Maybe negligence, but big leap from there to knowledge or intent. There was some evidence that some people in Mexico may have known, in the abstract, that there as laundering going on. But what was missing was evidence that anyone in the US had actual knowledge of specific illegal transactions. That's what they did have in this case. I read the indictment in HSBC. They didn't have the kind of spam dunk evidence they would've needed to get convictions in that case. They did here.
- patrickg_zill 12y ago
  IIRC, there was so much cash to move, that the cartel made custom-sized, reusable tote boxes, that fit precisely through the teller windows. To not notice that, when you have continuous video of all teller windows? Further, bank software makes a distinction between different financial instruments, for instance, if you deposit $8K in cash, or in cheque, or in wire transfer the deposit information will capture that difference. Even $10 billion in 100s, per year, divided by say 200 days that a bank is open, is $50 million per day. That is, 500,000 x 100 dollar bills, being deposited and counted, each and every day the bank is open. Does it sound reasonable to you, that their software wouldn't record that, and it would seem shall we say "odd" with even minimal review of their bank branches? It would take multiple tellers an entire shift to count such money. EDIT to add: even counting 1000 bills per minute with high speed counters, you have 500 minutes, which is 20 minutes more than an 8 hour shift with no break.
  - zorrb 12y ago
    Yeah, it is pretty hard to believe. Personal anecdote. About eight years ago I knew a guy who had a small diner in Michigan and the weekly deposits came out to be just under $10k, so $8700 this week, $9500 the next week. Nothing nefarious, that's just what it happened to be. I guess after three months of this the bank closed his business' account for "suspicious activity".
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
ginseg 12y ago
Popular justifications: -Banks are a matter of "national security". -Banks have heavy lobbies that we don't want disrupted. See also, "national security". -Bitcoin is a tool used for hacking. -Bitcoin is only good for drug deals. -Bitcoin upsets centuries of tax-optimized bondage imposed on money flow and markets. -Computer crimes are easy to find evidence for using Enhanced Evidence Procurement Measures (tm). -Press releases associating criminal activity with Bitcoin are great for defeating morale and dissent.
gedrap 12y ago
Financial crimes at this scale are extremely complicated and it's not as straightforward to just say 'send HSBC to jail'. Who's guilty and guilty of what is outside my armchair lawyer knowledge, maybe you are in a better position. Many people comment like 'law is for small people', etc. But it's just simply not understanding the crime of that nature. Huge money laundering operations are much more complicated than one guy treating bitcoin like monopoly money.

Where are the criminal convictions for HSBC and Wachovia's money laundering for the Mexican drug cartels? They laundered over $300 Billion USD over the years, and no one went to jail?

hurin 12y ago

Because criminal convictions against a major bank could have serious repercussions, probably both in terms of international relations and economically. In the same spirit - Silkroad the great online evil of the drug trade, had a yearly turnover of less than .1% of the world drug market.

higherpurpose 12y ago
Not as serious as sending them the message that they can continue uninhibited.
epscylonb 12y ago
If you owe me 100 dollars you have a problem, if you owe me a million dollars I have problem.

api 12y ago

Laws are for little people.

hfx902 12y ago
"Little people" may take offence to that. The correct saying would be "Laws are for poor people"
- forrestthewoods 12y ago
  "Little people" are free to be offended when that term is used with respect to them. However they don't get to ban the word 'little' from the english language. The way it was used was perfectly fine and correct.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

stevedekorte 12y ago

Or for Standard Chartered, ING, Credit Suisse, RBS, Llyods Banking Group and Barclays?

shalbert 12y ago

Unfortunately the answer is simple: "Too big to fail" I wish things were better justified than that, but they seemingly are not.

rayiner 12y ago

To get a criminal conviction, you have to show requisite intent beyond a reasonable doubt. The basis of the HSBC indictment was failure to classify Mexican operations as "high risk" and follow the higher standard for suspicious activity reporting. Maybe negligence, but big leap from there to knowledge or intent. There was some evidence that some people in Mexico may have known, in the abstract, that there as laundering going on. But what was missing was evidence that anyone in the US had actual knowledge of specific illegal transactions. That's what they did have in this case. I read the indictment in HSBC. They didn't have the kind of spam dunk evidence they would've needed to get convictions in that case. They did here.

patrickg_zill 12y ago
IIRC, there was so much cash to move, that the cartel made custom-sized, reusable tote boxes, that fit precisely through the teller windows. To not notice that, when you have continuous video of all teller windows? Further, bank software makes a distinction between different financial instruments, for instance, if you deposit $8K in cash, or in cheque, or in wire transfer the deposit information will capture that difference. Even $10 billion in 100s, per year, divided by say 200 days that a bank is open, is $50 million per day. That is, 500,000 x 100 dollar bills, being deposited and counted, each and every day the bank is open. Does it sound reasonable to you, that their software wouldn't record that, and it would seem shall we say "odd" with even minimal review of their bank branches? It would take multiple tellers an entire shift to count such money. EDIT to add: even counting 1000 bills per minute with high speed counters, you have 500 minutes, which is 20 minutes more than an 8 hour shift with no break.
- zorrb 12y ago
  Yeah, it is pretty hard to believe. Personal anecdote. About eight years ago I knew a guy who had a small diner in Michigan and the weekly deposits came out to be just under $10k, so $8700 this week, $9500 the next week. Nothing nefarious, that's just what it happened to be. I guess after three months of this the bank closed his business' account for "suspicious activity".

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

ginseg 12y ago

Popular justifications: -Banks are a matter of "national security". -Banks have heavy lobbies that we don't want disrupted. See also, "national security". -Bitcoin is a tool used for hacking. -Bitcoin is only good for drug deals. -Bitcoin upsets centuries of tax-optimized bondage imposed on money flow and markets. -Computer crimes are easy to find evidence for using Enhanced Evidence Procurement Measures (tm). -Press releases associating criminal activity with Bitcoin are great for defeating morale and dissent.

gedrap 12y ago

Financial crimes at this scale are extremely complicated and it's not as straightforward to just say 'send HSBC to jail'. Who's guilty and guilty of what is outside my armchair lawyer knowledge, maybe you are in a better position. Many people comment like 'law is for small people', etc. But it's just simply not understanding the crime of that nature. Huge money laundering operations are much more complicated than one guy treating bitcoin like monopoly money.