aangirfan: BANKS AND CRIME

Certain banks are linked to the bad guys in governments and in organised crime.

When a banker dies suddenly, you might ask if it is an accident or an assassination.

When a bank's share price comes tumbling down very far, you might ask if there is some kind of Mafia involvement.

A. On 5 April 2007, Lucy Komisar, at Inter Press Service, had an article about the bank called BCCI, which had links to the Bush family and Osama bin laden.

The article points out the following:

1. Both Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden used BCCI - the Bank of Credit and Commerce International.

2. During the presidency of Ronald Reagan, the CIA used BCCI to arm Saddam Hussein, to finance Osama bin Laden, and to finance the illegal Iran-Contra operation.

3. One of BCCI's largest Saudi investors helped bail out George W. Bush's troubled oil investments.

4. BCCI's corporate strategy was money laundering.

BCCI became the bank for drug dealers, arms dealers, and terrorists.

5. BCCI stole between 9.5 billion and 15 billion dollars.

Calvi

B. Bill Taylor, at the star.com, 10 11 2005, asked Why was 'God's banker' killed?

Roberto Calvi was the chairman of Banco Ambrosiano (linked to the Vatican Bank) and he had ties to the Vatican and the Mafia.

In 1982, when his bank was near collapse, Calvi was found hanging by a rope from scaffolding under one of the arches of Blackfriars Bridge in London.

Eventually, the police decided it was murder.

Eventually, the following were put on trial:

Pippo "the Cashier" Calo, a Sicilian Mafia chieftain;

businessmen Flavio Carboni and Ernesto Diotallevi;

Manuela Kleinszig, Carboni's ex-girlfriend;

and Silvano Vittor, Calvi's bodyguard.

The prosecution argued the accused lured Calvi to London to kill him after he held onto millions of dollars he was laundering for the Mafia and also stole from financier Licio Gelli, head of the illegal Masonic lodge, P2.

Reportedly, Calvi's widow Carla and son Carlo believe Roberto was the victim of a Mafia murder - to cover up the Vatican Bank's involvement with the Mafia.

All five defendants on trial for the murder of Roberto Calvi were acquitted. (BBC NEWS Europe 'God's Banker' death still a mystery)

Philip Willan inThe Sunday Herald (Sunday Herald: International) wrote:

"One possible lead is the role of the Slaughter and May solicitor Colin McFadyean, whose business card was found in Calvi's pocket. McFadyean told police he did not know Calvi and had no idea how he had acquired his card. He was never called to give evidence at either London inquest and City Police neglected to pass on the card.

"But Calvi's son Carlo now believes that McFadyean was just the sort of person his father needed to meet in London if he was to find the money he needed to stave off bankruptcy. And with a background in naval intelligence and high level contacts with Italian businessmen, he appeared singularly well-qualified to address the Milanese banker's concerns.

"Investigators may also wish to consider an affidavit by the American businessman Terence Byrne, a director of the arms company Allivane International, who suggested the Banco Ambrosiano collapsed because of its secret involvement in underwriting arms exports to Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

"Tescaroli has reportedly been engaged for some time on a second investigation into individuals suspected of carrying out or ordering the crime.

"Among the suspects identified by the Italian press is Licio Gelli, the venerable master of the once powerful P2 lodge. Former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi was once a member, as well as being a business partner of Flavio Carboni in some of his real estate projects in Sardinia."

Frank McGarahan

At 3 am, on 28 September 2008, Frank McGarahan, 45, was assaulted outside the Spearmint Rhino lap-dancing club, in Norwich in the UK, and later died. (Frank McGarahan, of Barclays Wealth dies after fight)

Frank McGarahan was the chief operating officer of Barclays Wealth.

He was in charge of assets worth £133 billion in 21 countries.

His bank last week acquired the private investment business of Lehmann Brothers

He was waiting for a taxi beside the Guildhall Hill rank in Norwich. Reportedly he saw someone being assaulted. He went to intervene and was himself badly beaten.

Have-a-go millionaire Barclays boss was beaten to death just 200 yards from police station.
Killed Barclays banker had tried to help homeless Lithuanian
Brother pays tribute to City banker who intervened in brawl

Reportedly, John Gray, 45, runs the Spearmint Rhino table dancing empire.

Reportedly Gray has served a jail sentence for fraud. ('Spearmint Rhino' lap-dancing clubs boss is convicted fraudster ...)

Gray is originally from California.

Spearmint Rhino's club in London's Tottenham Court Road has nude girls who dance around poles or for clients at their tables. The club also has booths where customers can ask girls for a private dance.

Gray's aliases in the United States include Johnny Win, John Luciano and John Luciano Gianni.

Spearmint Rhino is very popular with businessmen and bankers. (Brokers and Boozing)

Gray has a mansion in Buckinghamshire, two planes and a 55-ft boat.

In 1995, Gray, the owner of a Spearmint Rhino topless bar near Los Angeles, was arrested after complaints that he had written cheques that bounced.

At the time of being sentenced, Gray was already in prison for making a false statement to win a contract from the US Navy.

Celebrity lap-dancing club `is used as a brothel' Independent.

According to Wikipedia: Spearmint Rhino is a chain of strip clubs that operates throughout the United States, United Kingdom, Central Europe, Russia and Australia.

"The company was started by Greg Wheeler and he still owns all properties 100%."

In April 2006, the Slough club made the headlines when Prince Harry visited the club for a party celebrating the end of his training at Sandhurst.[1]

ATTA?

Daniel Hopsicker ('COCAINE ONE' BUST LIFTS VEIL ON GLOBAL NARCOTICS CARTEL) refers to:

"Bradford Keiller, a Las Vegas Strip club entrepreneur with a tastefully named string of strip clubs in London, Moscow, Las Vegas and Los Angeles, all called The Spearmint Rhino."

Brent Mudry, at CanadaStockWatch, (Deutsche Bank in major penny stock scandal) 14 November 2002, wrote:

"In one of the biggest fraud scandals to rock Bay Street in recent years, Deutsche Bank's Toronto branch and a recently terminated senior broker are the lead defendants in an unsealed $250-million suit claiming the Deutsche broker and two old friends, one of whom is a convicted felon, conspired with controversial international financier Adnan Khashoggi, a lawyer running a strip bar in Las Vegas, and unnamed others to rig Rafi Khan promotion GenesisIntermedia and several other stocks last year, causing the collapse of a small New Jersey brokerage and its Minnesota clearing brokerage...

"The named defendants in the Minnesota case are Deutsche Bank AG, Deutsche Bank Securities Inc., Deutsche Bank Securities Ltd., Mr. Breedon, RBF International Inc., Kenneth D'Angelo, Richard Evangelista, GenesisIntermedia, Ramy El-Batrawi, Mr. Khashoggi, his offshore Bermuda-based company Ultimate Holdings Ltd., Bradford Keiller...

According to US investigators, five of the 9 11 hijackers, including Mohammed Atta, visited Las Vegas at least six times between May and August 2001. (Atta, alcohol, strip clubs and drugs - 911myths)

The San Francisco Chronicle reported that in Las Vegas, they “engaged in some decidedly un-Islamic sampling of prohibited pleasures in America’s reputed capital of moral corrosion,” including visiting strip-clubs.

Atta and friends enjoyed the charms of lap dancer Samantha (Time.com and The Chronicle).

Jersey

1. In the UK, in 1999, Channel Islands regulators investigated allegations that more than 50 billion pounds of Russian currency reserves were secretly moved to Jersey.

(Jersey investigates Russian 'billions' Business guardian.co.uk / The Economy: Scandal at the bank )

Jersey's Attorney General Michael Birt, who was listed as a founder-partner of Financial Management Company (Fimaco), the company to which the reserves were transferred, said he had no recollection of the company.

Russia's former central banker Sergei Dubinin and deputy Sergei Aleksashenko confirmed to President Boris Yeltsin that cash reserves were transferred to Fimaco between 1993 and 1997.

Trichet

2. Jean-Claude Trichet is the president of the European Central Bank.

During the 1980s, the then state-owned Credit Lyonnais "lent money exuberantly, plunged into the red when many loans turned bad, and then cooked the books to disguise its losses." (Jean-Claude Trichet: Banker in a bind)

Trichet, a top Treasury official at the time, was accused of being involved in producing those misleading accounts.

Cleaning up the bank cost the French taxpayer as much as 30bn euros

3. Jeffrey Winters, an associate professor at Northwestern University, said his research suggested World Bank corruption wasted about $100 billion and when other multilateral development banks are included, the total rises to about $200 billion. (World Bank corruption may exceed $100 billion)

4. In 2002, an Indonesian court found the governor of the Bank Indonesia guilty of stealing 904 billion rupiah of Bank Indonesia funds in 1999 that were meant to be given to a local bank, Bank Bali.

Bank Bali, like many Indonesian banks, went bust in 1997.

Prosecutors stated during the trial that the money was used by the then president, BJ Habibie.

Photo of Abramovich by Mark Freeman

5. The Chelsea football club owner Roman Abramovich was a suspect in the case of the possible misuse of a $4.8 billion loan from the IMF to Russia. (Did the $4.8 billion loan from the IMF to Russia finance the Chelsea Football Club...)

Abramovich and his Runicom trading group were named in documents from a Swiss inquiry into what happened to money meant to help Russia.

The Swiss believed that Abramovich was one of the controllers of a web of slush funds.

US Federal prosecutors allege that the Bank of New York was linked to $7 billion in Russian money, some from criminal activities.

Some allegations have said the Bank of New York case included funds lent to Russia by the IMF.

Laurent Kasper-Ansermet, the investigating magistrate who launched the Swiss investigation, was left bleeding and unconscious in an attack in St Petersburg during a visit to Russia.

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