In ISIS Beatles case, UK Appeal Court rules that complying with some US MLATs to hand over evidence in an investigation is unlawful; relevant for Canada as well

Tweet Cruel and unusual punishment Everything I know about the Eighth Amendment and death penalty jurisprudence, I learned from former US Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, from whom I had the privilege of studying law during a course on international human rights and constitutional law. US Supreme Court Justice Kennedy, as he was then, was […]

Narcos Canada: Canadian banks & professions deal with significant proceeds of crime from narco trafficking and serious crimes; Canada listed again as “major money laundering country”; plus 10 money laundering areas of concern identified by the US for Canada

Tweet Canada still on the Majors List Canada made it on the “Majors List” in the annual US State Department’s International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (“INCSR“) again this year. The Majors List is three lists and it designates countries that are (1) “Major Illicit Drug Producing and Drug Transit Countries”; (2) “Major Precursor Chemical Source […]

Interpol holds emergency meeting over Ndrangheta

Tweet Interpol convened an emergency meeting a few weeks ago during its annual congress in Chile, to address information about how the Ndrangheta became the world’s largest and most powerful transnational criminal organization, and address strategies to counter their continued position of power. With operations in 30 countries, and its controlling families in Toronto, the […]

Dominican Republic alleged drug kingpin Caesar Peralta and his close ties to federal government officials

Tweet On August 20, the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC“) designated Caesar Emilio Peralta, a national from the Dominican Republic and the criminal organization he is said to control, as significant narcotics traffickers and a drug kingpin under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act. Alleged money launderer and trafficker Peralta is known as […]

$15 million in heroin seized from Iranian truckers entering Bulgaria

Tweet The Bulgarian police have seized a transport truck from Iran attempting to cross the Bulgarian – Turkey border with 288 kilos of pure heroin, with a street value of $15 million at the low end. The heroin was dry-walled, meaning each brick of heroin was covered individually with drywalling material. According to the US […]

23 members of transnational criminal organization arrested for money laundering

Tweet Europol announced today that the Spain and Columbia collectively arrested 23 members of an unidentified transnational criminal organization (the “Group”) involved in laundering the proceeds of crime on behalf of other unidentified transitional criminal organizations. The Group didn’t launder a lot of money – only €2 million.  The Group allegedly used Bitcoin to launder […]

Suspected Mexican cartel member indicted for trafficking enough fentanyl to kill 10 million people

Tweet Authorities in New York indicted a man alleged to be part of the Sinaloa Mexican cartel in connection with trafficking fentanyl in quantities that would kill 10 million people. Francisco Quiroz-Zamora, aka the “fat one” was charged under the Kingpin Act, which is significant because it carries a term of imprisonment of life on conviction. […]

Pope takes on the Mafia and international corruption

Tweet The Vatican’s justice branch has released its statement emanating from its recent anti-Mafia meeting with global law enforcement agencies to take-down the Mafia around the world through excommunication, if necessary. The Pope believes that he can make a difference in eradicating the Mafia and transactional criminal organizations through the reach of the Catholic Church. The […]

G7 to focus on transnational criminal organizations, aviation infrastructure security, terrorist financing

Tweet The G7 released a special statement on financial crime, promising to re-double its efforts from the last 12 months on ending financial crime, in particular terrorist financing and international money laundering involving transnational criminal organizations. Every year there is a commitment to these goals but this time, the G7 has promised to turn their statements […]

2017 Worldwide threat assessment – the rule of law is at risk

Tweet The Office of the Director of National Intelligence released its annual Worldwide Threat Assessment on May 11, 2017, from the US Intelligence Community and compared to last year, there are many more international threats to world security. The Threat Assessment from the US is a summary of all of the threats facing the US, […]