TEXAS BANK MANAGER'S 20 MONTH SENTENCE FOR LAUNDERING COCAINE PROFITS IS NOT A DETERRENT

STEPHEN ROLAND REYNA, the bank manager at a Wells Fargo Bank branch in Harlingen, Texas was sentenced to twenty months in Federal Prison on a Money Laundering Conspiracy charge. The defendant, whose bank is in a texas border town only 28 miles from Mexico, facilitated a major cocaine smuggling operation, allowed criminal deposits into accounts by co-conspirators, after which he directed his employees to allow withdrawals, bypassing bank protocols.

Reyna was paid a percentage of the amounts laundered in this manner. If there ever was a case which demanded a stiff prison sentence, to deter other bankers from even considering assisting traffickers in laundering their narco-profits, this is certainly it. The defendant was a bank manager, and he therefore had the authority to order his staff to move dirty money; his sentence should fit the seriousness of his crimes. Twenty months is not enough to insure that others will not be tempted.

Let the punishment fit the crime, please.