Monday, February 01, 2010
Federal Law enforcement set to grow even larger...
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I enter this post very cautiously, knowing that any criticism I offer is of a very well-educated opinion. However, I think that my observation is well grounded. Professor Berman highlighted protecting the United States interests, fighting financial fraud, as an area of concern. Specifically, he seems upset with the spending of $234M during this time of fiscal belt-tightening. His criticism with respect to this category lacks merit.
The white-collar community within federal law enforcement recovers more than it costs to fund every year. With respect to DOJ, since that is the agency criticized by Professor Berman, there are three primary agencies that investigate fraud:(1) the FBI, (2) DOJ-OIG, and (3) IRS-CI. Post 9/11 the FBI shifted resources to terrorism, leaving government fraud largely to the OIG's. This fact is well known within the prosecutorial and federal law enforcement community, but can be observed objectively through the creation of such beasts as the National Procurement Fraud Task Force. There, the OIG's play a very prominent or even dominant role over the FBI. This observation does not of course seek to diminish those FBI agents still fighting the good fight in white-collar. It is just an observation that they don't have the manpower or resources that they use to.
With this depletion of manpower and funding in white-collar crime investigations, the enforcement in this area is naturally diminished. Any fraud expert, as I consistently read in publications, will say that without an active enforcement or policing of internal management controls, fraud will flourish and a business will lose money.
It may seem counter-intuitive, but to save government money, it is necessary to spend money on enforcement. The FBI needs to get back in the game of white-collar crime, and the DOJ-OIG and IRS-CI can simply continue doing what they already do-consistently recover more money each year than Congress gives them. I give pause before I ever say "grow government," but good business practices support a robust enforcement of white-collar crime within the government, not fiscal belt-tightening.
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The white-collar community within federal law enforcement recovers more than it costs to fund every year. With respect to DOJ, since that is the agency criticized by Professor Berman, there are three primary agencies that investigate fraud:(1) the FBI, (2) DOJ-OIG, and (3) IRS-CI. Post 9/11 the FBI shifted resources to terrorism, leaving government fraud largely to the OIG's. This fact is well known within the prosecutorial and federal law enforcement community, but can be observed objectively through the creation of such beasts as the National Procurement Fraud Task Force. There, the OIG's play a very prominent or even dominant role over the FBI. This observation does not of course seek to diminish those FBI agents still fighting the good fight in white-collar. It is just an observation that they don't have the manpower or resources that they use to.
With this depletion of manpower and funding in white-collar crime investigations, the enforcement in this area is naturally diminished. Any fraud expert, as I consistently read in publications, will say that without an active enforcement or policing of internal management controls, fraud will flourish and a business will lose money.
It may seem counter-intuitive, but to save government money, it is necessary to spend money on enforcement. The FBI needs to get back in the game of white-collar crime, and the DOJ-OIG and IRS-CI can simply continue doing what they already do-consistently recover more money each year than Congress gives them. I give pause before I ever say "grow government," but good business practices support a robust enforcement of white-collar crime within the government, not fiscal belt-tightening.
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