Colombian man with links to pyramid scheme deported to US on money-laundering charges

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press

Colombian man with links to pyramid scheme deported to US on money-laundering charges
By Associated Press
3:47 p.m. EDT, October 22, 2009

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — A Colombian man with links to a pyramid scheme that bilked Colombians out of hundreds of millions of dollars was deported by Venezuela on Thursday to the United States, where he is wanted on money-laundering charges.

Venezuelan authorities took Luis Cediel to Caracas' main airport for the flight to the U.S. Justice Minister Tareck El Aissami said Cediel would be handed over to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

The Colombian was indicted by U.S. authorities in New York earlier this year along with three co-defendents, accused of coordinating the collection of millions of dollars in drug proceeds in Mexico City beginning in February 2008.

The indictment unsealed in March says Cediel worked primarily out of Mexico for DMG Group Holdings SA, a business that promised fantastic interest rates but collapsed last November, prompting hundreds of angry investors to storm the company's office in Colombia. Authorities arrested DMG's principals and shuttered the company.



Read more: http://www.courant.com/business/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-lt-colombia-pyramid-scheme,0,1315725.story

[EFerrari]

1. Darn, I thought they arrested Uribe!

:)

[Judi Lynn]

3. Strange how close this guy is, through his partner, David Murcia, TO Uribe!

They're having a hard time covering all the bases, as it has been learned David Murcia is a friend of Colombian President Alvaro Uribe's two sons...

No doubt they can't wait until they get BOTH these guys out of Colombia, safe in jail in the U.S., and away from international reporters.

Panamá, jueves 15 de octubre de 2009

Murcia to stand trial in the U.S.

Colombia's Supreme Court on Wednesday authorized the extradition of David Murcia to the United States to face charges of money laundering.

"The Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court issued a favorable opinion of extradition with respect to David Murcia Guzmán...so that he can be tried for conspiracy to commit the crime of laundering money," the court said in a statement.

U.S. authorities say Murcia and his partners moved several million dollars of profits from drug trafficking to more than 18 bank accounts in that country.

Murcia is being held in a prison in Colombia after his capture and deportation from Panama in November 2008.

His wife, Joanne Ivette Leon, was released in mid-March in Uruguay, where she was arrested, after prosecutors stopped extradition proceedings.

Murcia, through his attorney, said earlier this year that he preferred being extradited to the United States because he was not satisfied that he could receive a fair hearing in the Colombian courts.

http://mensual.prensa.com/mensual/contenido/2009/10/15/hoy/english/news_1225.asp

Earlier story:

Sales scam taints the 'Teflon President'
Peter Beaumont, foreign affairs editor
The Observer, Sunday December 7 2008

Once one of South America's most popular leaders, President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia has become embroiled in a hugely damaging scandal concerning a pyramid scam. The affair is denting his support and threatening his campaign to change the constitution so he can seek re-election for a third term.

The collapse of a series of pyramid schemes involving perhaps as many as 4 million out of 44 million Colombians has significantly reduced popular support for a controversial figure credited with driving leftist guerillas out of the cities and back into the countryside.

The sheer scale of the scandal has had consequences for the country's economy and politics and now the President's family after it was revealed that two of Uribe's sons were friends with one of the figures behind the worst of the scams.

According to the Washington Post last week, the Attorney General's office has reported that an estimated $1bn (£700m) has been lost in four southern states alone.

At the centre of Uribe's difficulties is the figure of David Murcia, a pony-tailed 28-year-old former travelling salesman, who set up DMG Group Holdings, described as a complex mixture between a pyramid scheme and a money-laundering vehicle.

More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/07/colombia-avara-uribe-pyramid-scam

http://blog.cleveland.com.nyud.net:8090/world_impact/2008/11/large_Arrests-Nov20-08-Colombia_Pyramid_Sche_Meye.JPG

David Murcia, orange shirt

http://www.cambio.com.co.nyud.net:8090/paiscambio/816/IMAGEN/IMAGEN-4826062-2.gif

[Peace Patriot]

2. Interesting to see this cooperation between Venezuela and the U.S.

I imagine that Venezuela has a few burned investors who would like to have seen Cediel's head on a plate in Venezuela, as well.

[Judi Lynn]

4. Colombia: Trusted American Ally?

October 22, 2009...9:45 am
Colombia: Trusted American Ally?

For the present administration (as well as the former), Colombia is considered an important strategic ally in the Americas, with its “like-minded” government providing a diplomatic counterpoint to left-wing power-houses including Venezuela. This summer, the countries forged the U.S.-Colombia Defense Cooperation Agreement, designed to “facilitate effective bilateral cooperation on security matters in Colombia.” The highly controversial agreement (at least in Latin America) allows the US military increased access to Colombian bases, ostensibly to battle narco-traffiking and other regional security threats.

This partnership would be ideal, if Colombia did not have one of the worst human rights track records in the world.

This week, a panel of experts and activists addressed Congress expressing their concern for the safety of human rights defenders in Colombia. United Nations Special Rapporteur Margaret Sekaggya testified that the Colombian government has failed to curb a “pattern of harassment and persecution” that plagues the efforts of human rights activists in the country, and has cost a number of them their lives.

According to Andrew Hudson of Human Rights First, activists in Colombia are subject to “the full gamut of human rights violations, including torture, threats, misuse of state intelligence, systematic stigmatisation, unfounded criminal proceedings and impunity for violations of defenders.”

Panelists pointed to the case of Carmelo Agamez, a human rights defender from the town of San Onofre, who has spent the last 11 months in jail after being accused of consorting with a paramilitary group that he had spent his life battling. In a phone interview from his jail cell, Agamez told the Christian Science Monitor that the charges were attempt to keep him quiet.

According to the panel, much of the blame for abuses falls on the government of current President Álvaro Uribe, who has labeled human rights activists as “subversive,” even going so far as to equate them to terrorists. Kelly Nichols, executive director of the U.S. Office on Colombia, further pointed out that “the capacity of the president and his advisors to order intelligence operations without safeguards or oversight” was in need of revision.

More:
http://dcprogressive.wordpress.com/2009/10/22/colombia-trusted-american-ally/