Life Insurer laundered drug money

 

Thursday, Mar 12,2009, 2:29:36 PM   Click:

Copyright: United Press International
Source: UPI Top Stories
Wordcount: 174

A now-closed Florida insurance company whose leaders have been charged with running an investment scam also laundered money from the drug cartel, authorities say.

U.S. prosecutors in January charged the two officers, the lead prosecutor and the trustee of mutual benefit Corp., Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with the organization of a system of elaborate Ponzi misled investors nearly $ 1 billion.

Court documents obtained by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel indicate the executives are also suspected of fraudulently selling insurance policies on the lives of people with fatal diseases for drug traffickers from Latin America, which has received policies at the beginning as a means to launder drug money.

U.S. and Florida regulators shuttered mutual benefits in 2004, seizure of property, and since then, nine employees were sentenced to a series of federal charges of fraud.

Mutual Benefits Steigner Joel, his brother Steven Steiner, lawyer Michael McNerney Livoti Anthony and the Trustee have all pleaded not guilty to fraud and money laundering charges, the Sun-Sentinel reported. None of them have been charged in connection with allegations of transactions related to drugs, the report said.



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