Archive

August 15, 2014

Former Hanover Corporation CEO Terry Kretz was sentenced to 14 years in prison and ordered to pay $14.8M in restitution for orchestrating an $18 million Ponzi scheme. According to court documents, Kretz offered clients the opportunity to invest in Hanover through promissory notes bearing high interest rates, however, more than half of the money invested in Hanover went to repay earlier investors, to pay Hanover’s salaries and overhead and to fund personal luxuries. Daryl Bornstein, a Hanover salesman, and Robert Haley, Hanover’s chief financial officer, previously pleaded guilty to similar charges. DOJ

August 14, 2014

Azzeddine El Amine of Costa Rica pleaded guilty to money laundering and operating an unlicensed money transmitting business in connection with his role in running Liberty Reserve, a company that operated one of the world’s most widely used digital currency services. Liberty Reserve was created to help users conduct illegal transactions anonymously and launder the proceeds of their crimes, and it emerged as one of the principal money transfer agents used by cybercriminals around the world to distribute, store, and launder the proceeds of their illegal activity. El Amine served as a principal deputy to Liberty Reserve founder Arthur Budovsky. Before being shut down by the government in May 2013, Liberty Reserve had more than one million users worldwide, including more than 200,000 users in the United States, who conducted approximately 55 million transactions through its system and laundered more than $6 billion in suspected proceeds of crimes, including credit card fraud, identity theft, investment fraud, computer hacking, child pornography and narcotics trafficking. DOJ

July 28, 2014

Lloyds Banking Group agreed to pay $86M for manipulating submissions for the London InterBank Offered Rate (LIBOR), a leading global benchmark interest rate. DOJ

July 24, 2014

An $80M False Claims Act judgment was entered against BNP Paribas for submitting false claims for payment guarantees issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The judgment resolves government charges that from 1998 to 2005 the French bank participated in a scheme to defraud the USDA’s Supplier Credit Guarantee Program under which American agricultural companies are encouraged to sell their products abroad. DOJ

July 24, 2014

Bernd Kowalewski, the former President and CEO of BizJet International, pleaded guilty to violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for bribing officials in Mexico and Panama to get contracts for aircraft services. BizJet is a U.S. subsidiary of Lufthansa Technik that provides aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul services. He is the third and most senior Bizjet executive to plead guilty to these violations. DOJ

July 21, 2014

Jing Wang, the former Executive Vice President and President of Global Business Operations for Qualcomm Inc., pleaded guilty to insider trading in shares of Qualcomm and Atheros Communications. He also pleaded guilty to laundering the proceeds of his insider trading using an offshore shell company. DOJ

July 17, 2014

William Pomponi, a former vice president of regional sales at Alstom Power Inc., the Connecticut-based power subsidiary of Alstom SA, the French power and transportation company, pleaded guilty for his participation in a scheme to pay bribes to foreign government officials in violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). Three Alstom corporate executives and Marubeni, a major Japanese corporation, have now pleaded guilty to a seven-year scheme to pay bribes to Indonesian officials to secure the $118M Tarahan power contract there. DOJ

July 14, 2014

Citigroup agreed to pay $7B to resolve government claims related to the bank’s packaging, securitization, marketing, sale and issuance of residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) which, according to the government, “contributed mightily to the financial crisis that devastated our economy in 2008.” The settlement includes a $4B civil penalty — the largest penalty to date under the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act (FIRREA). Whistleblower Insider

July 3, 2014

SunTrust Mortgage Inc. agreed to pay $320M to resolve a criminal investigation of SunTrust’s administration of the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). According to the government, SunTrust misled numerous customers who sought mortgage relief through HAMP by making material misrepresentations and omissions to borrowers in HAMP solicitations, and failing to process HAMP applications in a timely fashion. As a result of SunTrust’s mismanagement of HAMP, thousands of homeowners who applied for a HAMP modification with SunTrust suffered serious financial harms. DOJ

June 30, 2014

US Bank agreed to pay the $200M to resolve allegations it violated the False Claims Act by knowingly originating and underwriting mortgage loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) that did not meet applicable requirements. DOJ