Fixing the Match Fixers

by Aaron Kessler / Published February 20, 2012 in The Big Sweep | Leave a comment

Jun Lu, a Chinese soccer coach pictured here at the 2002 World Cup finals soccer match, was snared in a massive bribery scandal. / REUTERS

A Chinese crackdown on fixed soccer games and associated corruption has now resulted in 39 people being sentenced by a Chinese court – including two high-ranking soccer officials who received stiff prison terms Saturday.

Yang Yimin, who had been deputy chief of the country’s soccer association, got a 10-year sentence for taking about $200,000 in bribes, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency. The former head of the association’s referee committee, Zhang Jianqiang, got 12 years – he was convicted of taking more than $400,000 in bribes. Numerous coaches and other soccer officials were also sentenced.

According to Xinhua, Zhang took bribes from “eight clubs and two local football administrative centers,” and in one case took a $111,000 bribe (which he split with another official) to fix a crucial 2003 league championship game.

China’s professional football leagues “have been plagued with allegations of gambling, match-fixing and corruption for years,” Xinhua reports. “In order to clean up the game, a nationwide crackdown on gambling and match-fixing was launched by the government in 2009.”

Sweep to Former CFA vice-chief Yang Yimin jailed 10.5 years for bribery 

Sol Luis Fontanez has presided as mayor of Puerto Rico’s town of Barceloneta for more than 20 years. But last week he had what could be called a difficult lunch break – it ended with his arrest on corruption charges tied to a land deal.

Fontanez is alleged to have demanded nearly $200,000 in bribes from developers seeking to purchase two city-owned properties. He wound up receiving at least $55,000 in cash, but the FBI was listening in when the bribes went down, some of them in Fontanez’s own office.

The former mayor of the U.S. territory now sits in jail, as a judge denied him bail after he was caught – again on tape – making phone calls threatening potential witnesses against him.

Sweep to U.S. officials arrest longtime mayor of Puerto Rico coastal town

In a blow to federal prosecutors involved in a huge corruption case in New Jersey, a federal judge has dismissed all charges against a former state lawmaker.

Former state assemblyman and Jersey City mayoral candidate Louis Manzo was arrested in 2009 after allegedly accepting close to $30,000 in bribe money from an FBI informant. The original case was thrown out when an appeals court ruled that Manzo was improperly charged.

So the U.S. government tried again – as the Associated Press reports, they “brought new charges against Manzo, including two counts of violating the federal Travel Act by meeting on Staten Island with an undercover informant who posed as a corrupt developer and one count of not reporting federal offenses committed by others in the alleged scheme.”

Manzo argued, however, that the new charges shouldn’t be allowed to stand either. The federal judge hearing the case has now agreed – dismissing all charges. The overall corruption probe in New Jersey has seen more than 40 people prosecuted in what amounts to one of the state’s largest corruption cases ever.

Sweep to Charges dropped in NJ corruption case

Great Wall of Shame

by Diana Jean Schemo / Published February 17, 2012 in The Big Sweep | Leave a comment

Photo: REUTERS

In China, people convicted of bribing government officials have until now been able to move on and do the same elsewhere, with the odds good that their conviction will remain locked in the records of the courthouse that convicted them. This week, China unveiled an online national blacklist of people and companies convicted of bribery. The list so far counts 1,983 companies and 3,075 people.

Until now, there has been no central repository of information about bribery cases.  With this list, people can inquire about companies and people that may have prompted their suspicions.

The purpose of the list is to shame those who have paid bribes, and to alert local authorities, who can bar those named from winning government contracts. The list is also expected to assist criminal investigators, who have similarly been hampered by geography and a lack of coordination with colleagues elsewhere in the country.

Sweep to National bribery list goes online

Mirror, mirror on the wall

Who’s the baddest of them all? 

According to a new study, Chicago is the most corrupt city in the United States, while California and New York are the most corrupt states–followed by Illinois.

The study tallied federal corruption convictions since 1976. The district that covers Chicago had 1,531 convictions, while Illinois as a whole had 1,828. The study’s co-authors, Dick Simpson, a political science professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Jim Nowlan, a senior fellow at the University of Illinois Institute of Government and Public Affairs, titled the report “Chicago and Illlinois: Leading the Pack in Corruption.”

“For a long time – going back at least to the Al Capone era – Chicago and Illinois have been known for high levels of public corruption,” Simpson said at a press conference in Chicago’s City Hall, where he released the report. “But now we have the statistics that confirm their dishonorable and notorious reputations.”

“The two worst crime zones in Illinois are the Governor’s Mansion in Springfield and the City Council Chambers in Chicago,” he added.  While Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has appointed a new task force on corruption, Simpson suggested they start with an overhaul of ethics training, saying “people in this building don’t seem to have it.”

Sweep to Chicago area has most corruption convictions in nation, UIC study says

Anthony Shadid. / REUTERS

Anthony Shadid, a prize-winning veteran correspondent for The New York Times in the Middle East, died yesterday in Syria, after suffering a fatal asthma attack. He was on assignment with Tyler Hicks, a Times photographer who tried to save his life and then carried Shadid’s body across the border into Syria.

Shadid was reporting on the armed opposition to Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, without the government’s knowledge. It was a dangerous assignment as the country implodes, but one that was also vintage Shadid. He had been shot in Ramallah, arrested in Libya and harassed in Egypt. He cared deeply about the story, and risked his safety to get it right.

Shadid was a reporter’s reporter. He understood the countries and people he covered, and had bravery and a kind of humbleness that allowed him to meet people at their level, without looking down. His approach opened the way for genuine empathy and understanding of his subjects, conveyed in his every dispatch.

Shadid’s death is a tragedy for his family and for our friends and colleagues at The New York Times. It is also a loss for a world sorely in need of understanding.

Sweep to At work in Syria, Times correspondent dies

 

Second Reporter Killed in Brazil This Week

by Leslie Wayne / Published February 15, 2012 in The Big Sweep | Leave a comment
A second Brazilian journalist was killed in four days in Brazil.

A second Brazilian journalist was killed in four days in Brazil. / REUTERS

Another corruption-fighting journalist has been killed in Brazil.

Paulo Rodrigues, 51, a Brazilian journalist, was shot dead along the country’s rough border with Paraguay, the Associated Press reports. Rodrigues is the second Brazilian journalist killed in less than a week.  On Monday, Rodrigues was driving in the  town of Ponta Pora in Mato Grosso do Sul state when he was approached by two men on a motorcycle. Twelve shots were fired, five of them hitting Rodrigues, who died in a local hospital on Monday.

He had been editor-in-chief of Jornal da Praca newspaper and Mercosulnews.com website.  On the previous Thursday,  Mario Lopes, an online journalist, was shot and killed in Rio de Janeiro state.  Lopes had reported on corruption on his website Vassouras na Net.  This was the second attempt on Lopes’ life — last year he had survived after being hit by five shots in his office.  He had continued to write until his death.

Brazil is becoming an increasingly dangerous place for journalists. In 2011, six journalists were killed. Reporters Without Borders said last month that violence against journalists has caused the country to fall to 99th place in its ranking of freedom of the press around the globe.  It was a drop of 41 places.

Even those who had been criticized by Rodrigues mourned his death.  One of them was the mayor of Ponta Pora, Flavio Kayatt, who had threatened to sue Rodrigues in 2009 over what Kayatt had called misleading articles.

“He was extremely competent and idealistic,” said Kayatt, who was quoted in the Campo Grande News. “Of course, he had ideologies that didn’t meet ours. But we had a good relationship.”

Sweep to Brazil journalist killed in rough border town

Is it better to give than receive? When it comes to hidden assets, AP Singh, head of India’s Central Bureau of Investigation, says that both parties  – the giver and the receiver — should take equal responsibility, and criticism.

In his speech to the first-ever Interpol Global Program on Anti-Corruption and Asset Recovery, in New Delhi, Singh acknowledged that somewhere between $500 billion and $1.5 trillion in illegal money has been spirited out of the country and into offshore accounts.  For that, India has received a low score of 96 (out of 192) countries on Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index 2011.  Meanwhile, countries where the illegal funds are parked receive much higher scores — Switzerland is ranked at nine and New Zealand at number one.

To Singh, this is not fair. He questions whether tax havens like Switzerland, Dubai and the Cayman Islands bear any responsibility for this illicit transaction.

This from Singh’s speech:

“Fifty-three per cent of the countries said to be least corrupt by the Transparency International Index are offshore tax havens, where most of the corrupt money goes. The tax havens include New Zealand, which is ranked as the least corrupt country, Singapore ranked number five and Switzerland ranked number [nine].

There is a lack of political will in the leading tax haven states to part with information required to trace such assets, as they are all too aware of the extent to which their own economies have become geared to this flow of illegal capital from the poorer countries.

Perhaps too many people on both sides of the equation — those who give and those who get —  have a vested interest in keeping the system going.

Sweep to Switzerland more corrupt than India?

America's most forgetful sheriff?

America's most forgetful sheriff? / REUTERS

Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff who likes to call himself the toughest sheriff in America, turned evasive and forgetful once on the witness stand.

His testimony came during an appeals hearing over the firing of one of Arpaio’s employees on charges he had lied in a case involving political corruption. On the stand, Arpaio continued to deny that he knew anything about corruption and mismanagement in his office.  That was, he said, because he delegated many responsibilities and was unaware of what was going on in the Maricopa County sheriff’s office.

Arpaio seemed to suffer repeated memory lapses. He answered many questions saying he “couldn’t remember” much about a group called the Sheriff’s Command Association. The group is under investigation, allegedly for acting as an unregistered political action committee that had made political contributions to the Arizona Republican Party and aired ads attacking a Democratic rival for Arpaio’s post.  The money had been raised from local businessmen to counter attacks against the controversial sheriff’s deputies.

In testimony in other corruption-related trials involving Arpaio, the sheriff had also said he had little awareness of what was going on in his office and had delegated many responsibilities.

How convenient.

Sweep to Arpaio denies involvement in office’s corruption

Corruption, Dissected

by Leslie Wayne / Published February 12, 2012 in The Big Sweep | Leave a comment

Bill DeWeese, taking the oath for his 18th term in office. / PHOTO DEWEESE OFFICE.

Let’s call it “Anatomy of Corruption.”

In Pennsylvania, a scandal called “Bonusgate” has rocked the state for the past five years.  It involves over $2 million in bonuses that Democratic leaders gave to House legislative staffers in 2007.

By the time the dust had settled, an investigation into the illegal use of government funds for political purposes resulted in 25 arrests, 21 convictions and a guilty verdict last week against the man whose actions  started it all, Majority House Leader Bill DeWeese.

At every step along the way, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has been digging into the story, which has captivated – and disgusted – Pennsylvania voters.  In the end, some of the most powerful politicians in the state were brought down by the scandal – and many are headed to long prison terms.

Now the newspaper has published a retrospective that shows, step-by-step, how the scheme unfolded over the years. It is replete with tales of “no work” jobs, staffers described as “rock stars” and efforts to destroy evidence by drilling holes into hard drives.

The final chapter has still not been written. Yet it makes for fascinating reading, worthy of a crime novel – except that it is real.

Sweep to Bonusgate: How the statewide public corruption case unfolded

Just days after it was disclosed that former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is the subject of a federal grand jury investigation, the former mayor denied the charges.

Nagin is perhaps best known to the world as he pleaded for help as Hurricane Katrina and flooding ravaged the city. Now out of office, he says that the allegations against him are old news and that former members of his administration and vendors who were convicted of corruption may be turning against him.

The investigation, which was disclosed in the New Orleans Times-Picaynue, centers whether the city vendors gave Nagin perks such as plane tickets and whether vendors helped the Nagin family’s countertop installation business get a contract with Home Depot, at a time the big box giant sought to buy land in the city.  Other charges involve perks provided by a former – and now jailed – technology vendor to the city.

On a speaking engagement in Minnesota, Nagin dismissed the charges as little more than “rumors and innuendos.”  He said he wanted to put these allegations behind him and is eager to return to his city for many reasons, principally to escape the Minnesota weather. “Cold. single digits,” he tweeted. “Happy to be flying home.”

Sweep to Ray Nagin responds to the Times-Picayune story on corruption probe

Chinese investment in Africa often minimizes local involvement in production. / REUTERS

Is it better for donors to Africa to give things – totally completed projects – rather than money, which can be siphoned off to greedy hands?

That’s the intriguing questions being raised as China steps up its investment in Africa and is taking a completely different approach than Western donors.   An Associated Press story shows that China as been constructing roads, office towers, hospitals and other projects using Chinese labor and handing over the projects, once they are completed, to local African officials.

Aid watchdogs are now saying the Chinese approach may be a better model for helping local people than Western systems of foreign aid delivery, in which cash is given for projects, which often never get built as the money as pocketed by corrupt local officials.

Local Africans, tired of being ripped off by their own leaders, are applauding this turnkey effort. Sven Grimm, executive director of the Center for Chinese Studies at Stellenbosch University in South Africa says the China model is “more effective. It’s less prone to corruption.”

Augustine Ruzindana, Uganda’s former anti-corruption chief, said that “With the Chinese method it’s easier to show that something has been done. They do concrete things which can be seen by several generations.”

Sweep to China skirting African corruption in direct aid gifts

Their Ties, Your Money

by Diana Jean Schemo / Published February 10, 2012 in The Big Sweep | Leave a comment
Family ties? Rutgers University Law School collected some $3.3 million in Congressional earmarks. / RUTGERS

Rep. Robert E. Andrews helped secure some $3.3 million for Rutgers University School of Law in Camden, NJ, where his wife is associate dean in charge of scholarships. Rep. Norm Dicks, a Washington Democrat and former chair of an appropriations subcommittee, gave $1.8 million in taxpayer money to an environmental non-profit that his son was running. He topped that off with a $14 million earmark that the Environmental Protection Agency passed on to his son’s group to clean up Puget Sound.  Rep. C.W. Bill Young, a Florida Republican, helped appropriate some $73 million of taxpayer money to companies that employed his sons.

Spending is never so easy as when the money comes from someone else’s pocket. Better yet, everyone else’s pocket.

A wide-ranging investigation in the Washington Post this week shows dozens of congressmen and senators steering earmarks–federal money not open to competitive bidding–to benefit themselves or family members and friends. They have parked some $300 million on projects in close proximity to properties and businesses they own, and sent millions more to benefit their alma maters, companies in which they have financial stakes and charities that employ family members.

The really audacious part? It’s all legal, as Congress passed ethics and conflict of interest laws for the Executive branch that are far stricter that the rules they passed for themselves.

Sweep to Capitol Assets: Some legislators send millions to groups connected to their relatives

As the chief of Jordanian intelligence until 2009, General Mohammad Dahabi was a feared figure, on whose orders citizens could disappear into the maw of security services indefinitely.

On Thursday, Dahabi, brother of former Prime Minister Nader Dahabi, was taken into police custody. Prosecutors said they plan to hold him for 14 days at al-Juweida prison, while they investigate the general on charges of money laundering, embezzlement and abuse of power.

Prosecutors are also investigating Dahabi on allegations that he may have bribed scores of journalists.

Dahabi’s arrest grew out of a Central Bank investigation into money laundering, that has so far also snared a former mayor of Amman and several top businessmen. Two weeks ago, officials at the Central Bank accused al-Dahabi of laundering some $40 million.

Sweep to Former Jordan intelligence chief arrested on corruption charges

Francisco Illaramendi. / REUTERS

A $500 million Ponzi scheme that defrauded the pension fund of Venezuela’s state oil company relied on go-betweens and some $36 million in insider bribes to bilk the fund of hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Ponzi scheme was the work of Francisco Illaramendi, a Venezuelan-American hedge fund adviser who pleaded guilty to fraud and conspiracy to obstruct justice in connection with the scheme last March. Illaramendi, a former consultant for Petroleos de Venezuela  SA, or PDVSA, is under house arrest in New Canaan, Connecticut and awaiting sentencing.

His victims are suing Illaramendi in federal court in Connecticut, with the goal of recovering some $170 million illegally spent on bribes, kickbacks and “fraudulent transfers” that came to light through a receiver’s investigation. The suit alleges that Illaramendi bribed Juan Montes, a senior manager at PDVSA’s pension investment fund, and borrowed millions from a well-connected businessman, Morris Beracha, at exorbitant rates.

Sweep to Connecticut fraud lawsuit details bribery in Venezuela

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