(Title originally described the investment scam artists in question as "Wall Street Crooks", wrongly implying that all arrests were on Wall Street. It was in fact 500 across the United States. Still encouraging news, IMO!)
Although this story is getting buried under the giant Tax Cut flapdoodle, it appears to be great news for the Obama Administration and those who demand justice from at least some of the financial criminals who helped tank the economy.
From the Atlantic:
The Justice Department today announced that its intensive three-and-a-half-month effort to crack down on investment fraud has ended, with charges for more than 500 fraudsters. The staggering amount of deception uncovered by "Operation Broken Trust" led to $10.4 billion in investor losses. To give an idea of scope, of course, that's equivalent to about one Madoff. But in a way, these mini-Madoffs are just as bad, if not worse: they often take advantage of less financially savvy, and thus more vulnerable, consumers. There are more than 120,000 victims in these cases.
full atlantic article here:
http://www.theatlantic.com/...
A Washington Post article about the operation quotes AG Holder's remarks during today's press conference:
"With this operation, the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force is sending a strong message," Holder said. "To anyone operating or attempting to operate an investment scam: Cheating investors out of their earnings and savings is no longer a safe business plan. We will use every tool at our disposal to find you, to stop you and to bring you to justice."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
UPDATE 1 revised: Neither the Atlantic nor the Washington Post could confirm whether Operation Broken Trust was a part of the broader Wall Street investigation that Holder revealed was underway one week ago today. For more on that press release, see this WaPo link from Nov. 29:
http://www.dailykos.com/... )
UPDATE 2: Some commenters had a huuuge problem with my having used the term "Investment Banksters" in the diary title to describe those charged, because they say that suggests the most powerful major bankers, CEO's, i.e. those most responsible for the collapse. So I've changed it to 'Investment Fraudsters'. Sheesh.
UPDATE 3: From Kosack Iche liebe PBHO in the comments:
There were some CEO's Arrested check this out.
Second Former UBS Banker Snared in U.S. Municipal-Bond Bid-Rigging Probe
A former co-head of UBS AG’s municipal derivatives group faces a fraud charge tied to a $100,000 kickback for steering an investment agreement with a U.S. state to another bank.
Peter Ghavami, a Belgian national living in Moscow, was arrested Dec. 1 after arriving at John F. Kennedy International Airport, the U.S. Justice Department said yesterday. Ghavami, with UBS from 1999 until 2007, is the second former employee of the Zurich-based bank to be ensnared in the federal price-fixing probe of investment contracts governments buy with money raised in the $2.8 trillion municipal bond market.
more at this link below:
http://www.bloomberg.com/...
p.s. Who knows/cares if this arrest is officially part of Operation Broken Trust or last week's Wall Street crack-down announcement or neither or both. The important takeaway is that the wheels of justice appear to be rolling a little bit.
The GOP blocking of the tax cut bills on Sat. kind of dovetails with this story, emphasizing a single narrative of who's to blame for the nation's ailing economy - the deregulating corporatist billionaire-defending Republican greedsters.