Money laundering and counterfeiting by terrorist and drug traffickers

By Michael Webster: Syndicated Investigative Reporter. April 30, 2009 at 9:30 AM PST

Global terrorist organizations are teaching the Mexican Drug Cartels (MDC) new ways to launder their millions of dollars of drug money profits.

For years terrorist used systems of honor among themselves and would transfer money in person hand to hand the same way Muslims have been doing it for centuries. It is very hard that way to detect and it leaves no paper trail.

For a short while when expensive new color copiers first come onto the since the terrorist copied money very well, these new machines could copy money so well it was hard to detect. So the feds made the manufactures develop and install new detection devices that when money was placed on the bed of the copier it would shut down or alarms would go off or both.

Before the copy machines, PC’s and printers, counterfeiting was a difficult and expensive endeavor. You had to have money and lots of it to get started because it required large expensive printing presses and the talent and ability (rare) to cut intricate designs by hand into metal plates. But today as I write this it is much easier to create counterfeit bills and launder them by having several people pass them off to product and service providers. As thousands of teenagers have discovered so have the terrorist and now the MDC’s. You can now create fake money with a PC, a scanner and a color inkjet printer in about 10 minutes.

The terrorist barrowed from the American CIA the system they have used successfully for decades and the CIA are still using today. Which is investing in new start up business and expanding legal existing businesses than deposit the cash into those company bank accounts and transfer the money to offshore banks that they control? ­Money lau­ndering happens in almost every country in the world, and a single scheme typically involves transferring money through several countries in order to obscure its origins

However that you can not do anymore as the U.S. and UK governments have persuaded off shore havens and jurisdictions to sign new treaties that forbid that way of banking and made it illegal to not report even the attempt to the American authorities. As a result the global financial systems now play a major role in most high-level laundering schemes, the international community is fighting money laundering through various means, including the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF).

So now they are coming up with new ideas and ways to launder huge amounts of cash.

Money laundering, at its simplest, is the act of making money that comes from Source a look like it comes from Source B. In practice, criminals are trying to disguise the origins of money obtained through illegal activities so it looks like it was obtained from legal sources. Otherwise, they can't use the money because it would connect them to the criminal activity, and law-enforcement officials would seize it.

­­Money laundering is a crucial step in the success of drug trafficking and terrorist activities

An assessment by the U.S. Department of Justice National Drug Intelligence Center regarding Prepaid Store Value Cards reported that the cards provide an ideal money laundering instrument to anonymously move money without fear of identification or seizure.

The El Universal newspaper in Mexico City today 4/28/09 reported that what they refer to as narcotraffickers (MDC’s) are using prepaid value cards to send money from the US to Mexico because this financial instrument is not subject to the usual measures against money laundering, according to Arizona state Attorney General Terry Goddard.  ”This is something that is happening on our border, cards that are being provided by a few financial institutions, not major banks, but those that operate at a lower level,” he said during an interview.  The Prepaid Store Value Cards (as they are called in the US) are not defined as “monetary instruments” for money laundering and narcotrafficers is taking advantage of that, knowing that the cards will not be inspected at the border.  All who cross the border from the US to Mexico must declare if they are transporting more than $10,000 in cash?  Such people can carry more than a million dollars in value cards and are not required to declare it because they are not breaking any law, Goddard emphasized.  In his opinion, the cards should be inspected at the border and the amount contained in them deciphered electronically.  If the cards could be regulated, it would be another blow to smugglers and narcotrafficers.  ”This money is the fuel that is feeding the violence,” he said.

Arturo Mendicuti, president of the Chamber of Commerce Services and Tourism of Mexico City reported 777 million peso [56 million US] per day loss in the city’s businesses.  Hotel occupancy is the lowest in the past 16 years, between 5 and 10 percent.  The decline is now mainly attributed to the flu epidemic scare but many believe the war on drugs going on in Mexico is also a big contributor.  Restaurants are now can only take order for food as to go orders that is to say the customer can not eat the meal at the restaurant but can only come and pick it up.

New American money has high-tech counterfeit-proof bills so the U.S. Treasury claims. It first entered circulation in late 2003. Yes, it is detectable but million of dollars worth of counterfeit bills are still being passed on a daily bases.

It is true should you have real good eyes or a microscope and if you zoom in on different areas of the bill and look at them closely, in good light you can see a number of features designed to deter "casual counterfeiting." But who do you know who does that? Most passing of those bills happen in dark places like bars and other like type places. There are detector pens and roll over detectors but few retailers use them.

The amount of counterfeit money being passed daily by the terrorist and the drug dealers is not known but it is believed to be astronomical. And remember the really perfect counterfeit bills are never detected.

­­Money Scam Image Gallery

Department of Justice

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Sources:

 U.S. Department of Justice National Drug Intelligence Center

Arturo Mendicuti, president of the Chamber of Commerce Services and Tourism of Mexico City

U.S. Treasury

DEA

The El Universal newspaper

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