HOUSE PANEL APPROVES BILL EXTENDING REACH OF U.S. AUTHORITIES

WASHINGTON (AP) Seeking to stem the global growth of money laundering, a
House panel approved legislation Friday that would extend the reach of U.S.
law enforcement authorities fighting drug traffickers.

The bill whisked through the House Judiciary subcommittee on crime by voice
vote, sending it to the full Judiciary panel.

The move came about a week after U.S. authorities carried out a major
money-laundering sting. They arrested 160 people, including about two dozen
Mexican bankers, and seized $87 million, two tons of cocaine and four tons
of marijuana.

The sting, dubbed "Operation Casablanca," was the largest drug
money-laundering case in U.S. history. It exposed alleged links between
some of Mexico's largest banks and the Cali drug cartel of Colombia and the
Juarez cartel in Mexico.

"Every day, throughout the United States and around the world, (drug)
traffickers and organized-crime syndicates engage in thousands of financial
transactions so as to conceal their ill-gotten gain," Rep. Bill McCollum,
R-Fla., the subcommittee's chairman, said before the vote. "The methods
used by drug organizations to launder their money have grown increasingly
complex and exotic."

People committing crimes abroad are using the United States and its
financial institutions as havens for laundered money, while criminals
operating in this country are using foreign banks and bank secrecy laws to
hide their illegal gains, McCollum said.

Authorities estimate as much as $500 billion is laundered worldwide every year.

The legislation would revise existing laws to allow U.S. authorities to
confiscate the proceeds of crimes committed abroad and to have access to
records located in foreign countries.

It also would add operating an illegal money-transmitting business to the
offenses subject to civil forfeiture. Under current law, it is a federal
offense to operate a money-transmitting business without a state license.

In a related development Friday, Rep. Jim Leach, R-Iowa, chairman of the
House Banking Committee, proposed a separate money-laundering bill that
would transfer from the U.S. tax code to the Bank Secrecy Act the
requirement for car dealers and other merchants to report cash transactions
over $10,000.

The change would give all federal law enforcement authorities, as well as
tax agents, access to the information, Leach said.

The Judiciary subcommittee also approved, by voice vote, a bill that would
increase the penalties for manufacturing, trafficking in or importing
methamphetamine, the fastest-growing drug problem in much of the Far West
and Southwest. The drug, known by the nicknames meth, crank and speed, has
a potent effect on the central nervous system and often creates delusions,
paranoia and aggressive behavior.

Under the legislation, making, trafficking in or importing 50 grams or more
would trigger a 10-year mandatory minimum prison sentence, and five grams
would bring a five-year minimum sentence.

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)