Latin American Embezzlers Feeling Chill in Miami?

The 15-agent task force has already scored one high-profile success -- seizing in December a $3.5 million condominium in the exclusive Miami community of Key Biscayne and $150,000 in cash from former Nicaraguan tax chief Byron Jerez.

The Jerez case opened up corruption charges against ex-President Arnoldo Aleman, known as the "Fat Man" for his girth and lifestyle, and who was last month hauled off to prison in Nicaragua for misappropriating up to $100 million.

"I believe it (the Jerez case) might be the tip of the iceberg," said Richard Kolbusz, assistant special agent in charge of the Foreign Corruption Financial Task Force based at the ICE offices in Miami.

Hot on the heels of Jerez, the unit began an investigation into former Guatemalan President Alfonso Portillo, said the U.S. customs service veteran. The Portillo case, according to judicial sources, involves wire transfers through shell corporations, and may amount to as much as $250 million.

Jerez's Miami lawyer, Michael Diaz, said the Aleman and Portillo cases were linked. Both involve the same Panamanian front companies and individuals who Diaz said appear to have run "a corruption-referral service."

Kolbusz declined to identify any of the other suspects in the task force's sights, except to say that all but one of the eight countries involved was from the region.

But other industry insiders say probes are underway into the $2 billion collapse, under massive fraud, of one of the Dominican Republic's top banks, Baninter, and into officials from Ecuador, Peru and Honduras.

The Miami task force has been such a hit within the new Department of Homeland Security since it was formally established last August that ICE plans to set up similar investigative units in New York and Los Angeles.

Money laundering experts say Miami was the perfect place to start. 'CORRUPTION CITY'

"This is corruption city," said Charlie Intriago, publisher of industry news sheet Money Laundering Alert.

"There are billions of dollars in South Florida real estate and South Florida bank accounts from present or former corrupt foreign leaders, military, civilians and their families and close associates, and that includes mistresses, girlfriends, boyfriends."

Critics say that while haranguing offshore financial centers in the Caribbean for banking secrecy that encouraged money laundering, the United States has been slow to deal with the billions in hot money flowing through its own system.

That changed with Sept. 11, 2001, and a realization that terrorists were just as likely to exploit weaknesses in bank regulation and monitoring to finance attacks, as drug dealers and other criminals were to launder their loot.

The Florida crackdown was made possible by new provisions in the USA Patriot Act that made foreign bribery and corruption a crime punishable under U.S. law, if the money was laundered, or transported, through the United States.

Kolbusz said any cash or assets seized would be returned to their home country -- more often than not among the world's poorest -- and where the money "maybe can be put to good use."

"For us it's mainly cracking down on corruption, plus it really sends a message to the other countries that the United States is here to help," he said. "It sends a message to future persons that may be in these high offices that, hey, you can't do that anymore. There's really nowhere to hide."

To buttress its campaign against foreign corruption, the U.S. government is canceling visas -- depriving Latin American officials of their regular shopping trips to Miami.

The Florida office of ICE is, in addition, at the forefront of efforts to finally hunt down and deport scores of accused human rights abusers sheltering in the United States from justice. Almost 60 have been kicked out of Florida in recent years, including convicted Haitian death squad members.

Money laundering experts and regional academics applaud the new anti-corruption vigor of the U.S. authorities.

But they also harbor doubts as to its reach.

"You'd have to indict 80 percent of Key Biscayne and 60 percent of Coral Gables," if you were serious about corruption, said Eduardo Gamarra, director of the Latin American and Caribbean Center at Florida International University.

Intriago said that going after corrupt foreign officials was a "noble idea."

But it might not stop stolen money from being stolen again after it is repatriated unless the U.S. authorities also went after the Miami banks, lawyers, accountants and real estate agents who made laundering it not only possible but easy.

"Otherwise it's the six step Latin American corruption tango -- steal, launder, invest, seize, return, steal," he said. "It just changes hands."

Source: Yahoo News