PANAMANIAN ORGANIZED CRIME PROSECUTOR OBTAINS EXTENSION IN MOSSACK FONSECA INVESTIGATION

Javier Caraballo, the lead organized crime prosecutor investigating Mossack and Fonseca since April 2016, has obtained an extension of time, in which to continue his ongoing investigation of alleged criminal conduct of Mossack. He has requested judicial assistance from sixteen foreign jurisdictions, and sent out material, after requests were received, from six, all arising out of the Panama Papers documents.

Of course, the public relations staff at Mossack Fonseca has gone to great pains to deny that the law firm is guilty of money laundering, or of facilitating the proceeds of crime, of corruption, or of terrorist financing. Perhaps the most maddening statement to come out of the Mossack firm is its insistence that, notwithstanding that it has drawn the largest six figure fine, ever levied by BVI regulators, for massive AML and CIP deficiencies, that it is innocent, because the firm was not charged with a crime in the British Virgin Islands. Do they take compliance officers, who have seen portions of the Panama Papers, for complete idiots ? Criminal liability is obvious.

Unfortunately, since Panama has literally no attorney discipline process worthy of the name, expect Herr Mossack and Sr. Fonseca to continue to operate their firm, which constitutes a clear and present danger, to financial institutions in North America and Western Europe, for some time in the future. You can thank a system where a lawyer can buy a law degree for cash, and obtain a law license, and later routinely return to the practice of law, after serving a term of imprisonment for a felony, and where no lawyers are ever disbarred.