Prosecutors Open Probes As World's Wealthy Deny 'Panama Papers' Links

[Purveyor]

Source: Reuters

Governments across the world began investigating possible financial wrongdoing by the rich and powerful on Monday after a leak of four decades of documents from a Panamanian law firm that specialized in setting up offshore companies.

The "Panama Papers" revealed financial arrangements of politicians and public figures including friends of Russian President Vladimir Putin, relatives of the prime ministers of Britain, Iceland and Pakistan, and the president of Ukraine.

While holding money in offshore companies is not illegal, journalists who received the leaked documents said they could provide evidence of wealth hidden for tax evasion, money laundering, sanctions busting, drug deals or other crimes.

The law firm, Mossack Fonseca, which says it has set up more than 240,000 offshore companies for clients around the globe, denied any wrongdoing and called itself the victim of a campaign against privacy. Mossack Fonseca, in a statement posted on its website on Monday, said media reports had "misrepresented the nature of our work."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-panama-tax-idUSKCN0X10C2

[angstlessk]

1. This is too complicated for my little brain, but

I hope it means what it implies

[Plucketeer]

2. It means

that we peons foot the bill for most everything, while the very upper percentile of wealthy USE what' we've bought while never adding a dime to our coffers. Not that it's a big surprise, but we're being scammed in essence.

IF we could elect ourselves a president who would appoint an ambitious attorney general - one that actually did some law enforcement - we'd be one big step closer to the game-revisioning "revolution" a certain aggresive senator keeps talking about.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. Also, the shell game with money is a very very old one.

Nixon had a bag, literally a bag of $300,000 that John Michell got from overseas money ( Cuba mafia seems to be the source) and used part of it to pay off the Watergate burglars.

[dinkytron]

33. It's the Matrix. Only real life.

[christx30]

3. I think it does.

There's no way that much money and paper gets pushed around like that without SOME kind of wrong doing happening. And if prosecutors are getting involved, maybe we can see some indictments coming down. Here's hoping.

[dixiegrrrrl]

9. Really good easy to understand explanation here:

The Panama Papers – 11.5 million leaked documents that detail the inner workings of Mossack Fonseca, a law firm accused of helping drug lords, sports stars, Ponzi schemers, kings, presidents, prime ministers, FIFA officials, Mafia members, high-profile thieves, high-ranking politicians and at least one convicted sex offender launder money, evade taxes and escape criminal prosecution – are a big deal.

Mossack Fonseca has ties to the £26 million Brink's-MAT robbery of 1983, which British media called "the crime of the century". Thirty three of its clients have been blacklisted by the US government for allegedly doing business with Mexican drug lords, terrorist organisations and "rogue nations" like North Korea and Iran. Its files have unearthed a secret, shady $2 billion (£1.3 billion) trail of money that leads to Vladimir Putin. One of its clients played a crucial role in the Watergate scandal. Another was convicted for the torture and murder of a US drug enforcement agent.

With a story this big – dubbed by Edward Snowden as "the biggest leak in the history of data journalism" – it can be difficult to understand exactly what's at stake. The Panama Papers are, unquestionably, insane. But what do they have to do with you?

If you live in one of the 200 countries and territories that Mossack Fonseca's clients call home – and, given the fact you're reading this article, you probably do – the story of the Panama Papers is your story. The money the law firm helps to hide should be used to pay for your schools, your highways, your hospitals. The criminals it works with run the most violent illegal organisations your country has ever seen. The politicians who have taken and made bribes, dodged taxes and amassed fortunes of unimaginable scale are your politicians.

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/why-you-should-care-about-panama-papers-mossack-fonseca?utm_source=vicenewsfb

More at the article

[underpants]

26. Excellent. Thanks dixiegrrrrl!

[DJ13]

4. Pay your taxes ya deadbeats!

[olddad56]

5. looks likely that some people who know too much will be getting suicided before too long.

always seems to happen when the bloodhounds get too close on the trail.

[Kelvin Mace]

10. Problem is,

the evidence is already out. Too late to kill anyone. Documents are the best evidence of fraud.

[certainot]

15. not ure about that. every case could involve people who could be

pressured to testify, etc, in trials.

[Kelvin Mace]

18. Sure, people are unreliable

That's why the documents are so valuable. Concrete evidence of what you did, when, and how. You can't intimidate a copy of a certified check not to testify. You can't pay of a private memorandum of understanding.

[cstanleytech]

6. "Prosecutors Open Probes to protect their special friends" is probably what it

will come down to or atleast thats what my cynical side believes will be the most likely outcome for the vast majority of these so called "probes".

[warrprayer]

8. let the good times roll baby

[greiner3]

11. Waiting for Trump's name to pop up

Wonder if even him hiding a billion dollars from paying taxes would resonate on supporters. Nah

[Purveyor]

12. I'm waiting for a lot of 'names' to pop up, indeed. eom

[passiveporcupine]

14. I'm wondering how much the Waltons have stashed away over there.

All these wealthy people want their countries to be strong and then they do this...as if countries didn't run on taxes.

[fasttense]

17. I find the vast silence from the corporate media about US politicians involved in this

to be very strange. Where are the US uber rich hiding their money? Where are the corrupt politicians from the US? I don't for a minute believe that no one in a position of power in the US has been involved in this. And yet there seems to be no understanding from our corporate media that soon it will be their time to explain.

It seems like the other shoe has yet to fall.

[2naSalit]

29. Indeed, that is the "other shoe" that will drop in due time...nt

[fasttense]

30. I hope you are right but I fear the information is being sanitized. n/t

[2naSalit]

31. Of course it it.

That doesn't mean the info isn't already available to those who will share before the redactions are done. It's already in the public domain.

What I see as a possible outcome is that the 99% finally says "no" when asked to do their bidding. I think this whole "thing" is about to change the game in ways we haven't really considered. Fasten your seatbelt.

[passiveporcupine]

13. While holding money in offshore companies is not illegal,

It damn well should be. We need to work on this.

[certainot]

16. the stuff i saw didn't include americans... am i wrong?

[Skittles]

21. 441 Americans, not named

not sure why

[certainot]

22. great, thanks for that

soon to be named, hopefully

[SleeplessinSoCal]

19. the challenge now is to spread this news as far and wide as possible.

My Facebook page isn't enough.

[Major Hogwash]

20. PANAMA!!

[turbinetree]

23. Ten Years After ......................Iron Maidan.................

[Jack Rabbit]

24. K/R

[Javaman]

25. "never been charged with or formally investigated for criminal wrongdoing in its nearly 40 years

of operation"

there's always a first!

[Sunlei]

27. Seems like all the corrupt 'leaders' move the money to family members and close 'friends'

[OnlinePoker]

28. Here's an interesting piece from the NYT

Are any Americans named in the leaked documents?

The documents indicated that 3,500 people who owned shares in offshore companies provided the Panamanian law firm with an address in the United States, but that does not mean they are American citizens. Scanned copies of at least 200 American passports were included in the trove of documents, according to McClatchy, which said that many appeared to be retirees using offshore companies to buy real estate in Latin America.

In addition, almost 3,100 companies incorporated by the law firm were linked to what McClatchy called “offshore professionals” based in the United States.

But it is not clear how many United States citizens were implicated in the schemes described by the articles. So far, the documents have connected no American politicians or other influential people to Massock Fonseca, according to McClatchy and Fusion.

One reason there may be relatively few Americans named in the documents is that it is fairly easy to form shell companies in the United States. James Henry, an economist and senior adviser to the Tax Justice Network, told Fusion that Americans “really don’t need to go to Panama.”

“Basically, we have an onshore haven industry in the U.S. that is as secretive as anywhere,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/05/world/panama-papers-leak-offshore-tax-havens.html?_r=0

[fasttense]

32. Thanks for the info, very interesting. n/t