Attorney General Can Help You Tackle Money Laundering by Drug Dealers

My office is here to help you access the information and enforcement resources you need to effectively fight drug crime and money laundering in your communities. One way we do this is through the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) Gateway program. As the state coordinator for the Gateway program, the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) can access more than 130 million financial Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) records. Our financial analysts can help your office understand the data and decipher complex patterns of transactions used by criminal groups to disguise their illegal activities.

The Gateway system also has a unique alert mechanism that automatically signals FinCEN whenever two agencies have an interest in the same subject. This helps state and local law enforcement coordinate their investigations among themselves and also with federal agencies.

My office can assist you through our partnership with the INTERPOL-U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB), a police-to-police communications and intelligence network for American and foreign agencies seeking help in criminal investigations that extend beyond their national boundaries. As the conduit for all Texas state and local requests for exchange of information with INTERPOL-USNCB, the Office of Attorney General (OAG) can facilitate your investigations when they involve other countries.

We participate in all phases of money laundering cases, cooperating with local law enforcement and prosecutors’ offices in investigation, surveillance, search and seizure, as well as obtaining warrants, making arrests and securing felony convictions and guilty pleas.

This cooperation can yield big results. In one recent case, the Uvalde County district attorney asked my office to work with the Uvalde County sheriff’s office to investigate allegations of money laundering by a local resident. We did, and after several months of investigation involving sheriffs from surrounding counties, three ranches were searched, yielding $536,000 in drug money, more than 1,700 pounds of marijuana, and numerous vehicles and weapons. These searches enabled the U.S. attorney in Del Rio to return nine indictments. Seven of the conspirators eventually pled guilty and two were found guilty by a jury.

In another case, the OAG was able to tie a routine drug interdiction stop at a bus station to a Drug Enforcement Agency case called “Operation Horseshoe.” A cooperating co-defendant provided sufficient probable cause to initiate two separate wiretaps, which resulted in nine search warrants in the Rio Grande Valley. Fifteen arrests were made and $100,000 and multiple vehicles were seized.

My office can also help establish the money trail, as we did in a Dallas case where the subjects were laundering money through money orders via U.S. mail. The U.S. Postal Inspection Service had noticed several overnight express packages being delivered to the same residence each day. The OAG executed a search warrant, found the money orders, and traced them back to the bank accounts where the money was being deposited. All suspects were convicted in federal court.

We can also help put together solid money laundering cases. During a routine traffic stop in Medina County, Department of Public Safety officers discovered the individual also had $45,000 in drug money. As it turns out, the suspect was a major heroin dealer from Fort Worth, wanted by every narcotics task force in the area. My office helped prepare a case with excellent physical and overwhelming circumstantial evidence, and following a criminal jury trial the subject was convicted of money laundering.

My office is here to assist you in the fight against drug crime in Texas. David Boatright, chief of the OAG’s Criminal Investigations Division, is the official state coordinator for the FinCEN/Gateway Program and INTERPOL. Karen Seidel serves as our primary point of contact, and can assist state and local law enforcement with case research requests. Karen also serves as the state liaison with the U.S. Department of Treasury, FinCEN and INTERPOL-USNCB programs.

Let us know how we can help you.

Greg Abbott
Attorney General of Texas