Money Laundering Bulletin

The November 2000 issue of The Money Laundering Bulletin featured commentary on the case of A Bank v A Limited and Serious Fraud Office. In the intervening period the case went back to the Court of Appeal only to see its impact reduced by the new ruling. Michael Grant of London Guildhall University reviews the judgment.

In an innovative move to combat organised crime, Ireland established the multi-agency Criminal Assets Bureau in 1996. The Proceeds of Crime Act 1996 which lies at the centre of the co-ordinated powers of the CAB enables the Bureau to deal with the proceeds of crime not as part of the criminal process as it is wholly unrelated to any criminal proceedings against a defendant at all. Essentially it uses the civil courts and operates entirely outside the criminal justice system. In the first part of a two-part article Michael Ashe and Paula Reid examine the structure and operation of the Criminal Assets Bureau and consider in detail the Proceeds of Crime Act 1996

It might be assumed that the fast moving world of money laundering would be matched by equally speedy responses by law-makers, but think again when considering the framing of European law says Keith Nuthall.

Neil Jeans, Group Money Laundering Reporting Officer for ABN AMRO, provides a lucid explanation of a highly sophisticated money laundering system in which funds have been cleaned through capital and securities markets at a profit to the launderers.

Rowan Bosworth-Davies suggests that the United States would do well to examine the record of its own business dealings with correspondent banks before it engages in further criticism of the other jurisdictions for failing to enforce strict anti-money laundering regimes.

The title of the minority staff report of the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations sums up its findings. If the message were not clear enough, it is spelt out in the opening sentence: “US banks, through the correspondent accounts..