Osler's Razor

Not sure if you wanted substantive suggestions, but I have one:

In Part III B, you might set out the beauty of how the in rem forfeiture of the money works, i.e. the government seizes the property, and anyone aggreived has to file a claim to it. Of course, the beauty of this procedure in a drug-trafficking enterprise is that no one involved in the enterprise will be in a position to enter a claim to it, which makes it an easy case to litigate. We had a lot of these when I was with the federal courts, and I never saw a claim entered for forfeited property.

I know that you know all of this, but a lot of readers might not, and I think it bolsters your point in the abstract by concretely showing how effective your approach would be.
 

No-- that's exactly what I want!
 

Good idea, how do you make it happen?

You should have Dee Dee work on it. That intern could help.
 

My comments are so far from substantive that you'll laugh, but I'm waiting for an uninterrupted moment to actually read and digest the whole thing. In the meantime, footnote 2 needs punctuation, and footnote 9 says "two idea."
 

Ditto the punctuation for footnotes 3, 21, 55, and 59. Have I earned a slice of that bread yet?
 

First, and as you know, I am not a lawyer. I like the idea, but I would want to know just how this dirty money can be identified, and can be proven to be dirty "beyond a reasonable doubt."

Second, and this is really, REALLY nit-picky, but is the word in the first paragraph "loath" or "loathe." I loathe something, or I am loath to do something, but I don't think I loath anything.

Normally, I'm a real grammar geek. My apologies if I'm stepping out of bounds.
 

For a grammar geek, I got my own punctuation wrong!!!

I used a period in my comment above (about "loath" or "loathe") instead of a question mark.

:-/
 

Grammatical and punctuation errors aside (you have to give the scribes something to do) your article is best summarized in your very first paragraph. The problem of narcotics trafficking and all it’s many ramifications is a big sore for a society that practically invented pragmatism. After all a problem is just a situation that invites a solution. A solution which in the case of “America’s War on Drugs” not only failed to solve the problem time and again it lost the war miserably (I was shocked by the numbers in the US corrections budget). Which begs the question why this huge momentum, when all the approaches you list are variations on the same theme and worse, they seem to further complicate the problem. I agree with you in that legalizing narcotics is the worst solution ever, given the devastating effects of drug addiction and that even a ridiculous high tag is no deterrent whatsoever, just a higher incentive for drug procurement related crimes . I’ll venture a guess that drug trafficking didn’t start because everybody wanted to have one fun gigantic stoners party, it started because there was money…make that, LOTS of money to be made. And it is mind boggling that nobody thought of hurting that very issue before. But I’m glad you did and I hope your proposal will be heard, considered and better yet, implemented. It would be a shame for a country that prides itself to be first and foremost practical, the problem solvers of the world after all, to be stuck in a rut, unable to stop a solution seeking momentum built on failure when it comes to a problem that is eroding the fabric of this society on so many layers.
 

Just saw this article (apologize for not knowing how to make the link work), which I thought was à propos...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110404/ts_yblog_thelookout/cocaine-smugglers-laundered-billions-through-wachovia-bank
 

I found the concept a good one. And have similar concerns like Tall Tenor with regard to the money flow. From a banking standpoint there are already many money laundering laws in place. How are they getting the money out of the country now? The IRS should also be going after the sellers for back taxes.


As a person who recently helped close down a drug seller in my neighborhood you can not lose sight of the fact that the buyers and sellers are still a more immediate concern to the ordinary citizen. I do not want the teeneager living next door to me selling on my street and all the of the 'obvious' traffic that comes with it. And my neighbors didn't want the action going on either.
 

I agree with the premise but feel that you might be lacking in real specific issues. As a policy paper it definitely is a good one, but would require much more in depth analysis to become useable.

Playing Devil's advocate: I think you underestimate the difficulty in indentifying which money is related to drug enterprises rather than semi-legitimate ones. Also, it's been my experience that most of the money that leaves this country is done in very small amounts that aggragate into the global numbers. For example: Dealer sells his dope and pays his supplier in mexico by transferring $1000 - $5000 through western union. The guy in mexico then aggragates and ferries the money down to columbia/peru. THe western union transfer doesn't raise any eyebrows because it's typical for millions to be sent back each month by workers here in the US. You still have to identify (and possibly handle) the low level dealer to get at the guy in Mexico and then Peru. Unfortunately, our reach isn't that great to be able to go after a guy who will move operations in Mexico if there is a problem here.

I agree that the actual cash bundles could be stopped for the most part, but as we've seen recently, border security is a hot button issue. And with thousands of miles of unprotected border, there is currently no way to stem the tide of cash leaving the country with a physical presence.

Lastly, because the amounts of drugs entering the country is small per individual batch, the money leaving is also small and thus generally untraceable.
 

DDA--

You don't seriously think that drugs enter the country in "small, per-individual batche[es]," do you? Your scenario seems to envision that drugs enter the US through a system where individuals carry a small batch in, then wire money out. That's just not the case. Money goes out in large batches, and the drugs come into the country in a variety of sizes and means.

If you are suggesting that cartels might accomodate pressure on bulk cash and wire transfers by using tiny Western Union transfers to aggregate money in Mexico, that would be very easy to track, by tracing the recipients in Mexico (by Western Union records) and then interdicting payments to those targets.
 

Of course I'm speaking in relative terms. a 2 kilo batch isn't all that big, but that's the size of many intercepted batches.

Many of the guys I prosecuted in Dallas (a major hub by any standard) did not involve much more and in fact involved less. This would be the mules you refer to that get paid to smuggle drugs in their suitcases or on their person and the drop-off locations where the drugs are cut.

As for tracking the receipients of the money...easier said than done. The middle men who aggregate in mexico use proxies, often female family members to go get the cash from western union and those types of services. They often use different people. Making the process harder to track and stop. And it's not exactly like record keeping is taken seriously in other countries.

My overall point is this, while the idea to cut off drugs by targeting the money flow is a great one, even if we deployed hundreds of investigators into that field, it will be difficult to implement. You will still have to identify and turn the low level criminals to trace the money back.

While we can definitely go after the big fish, because of what I've seen, there will have to be just as much emphasis paid to the low level guys to make this work. Thus defeating the stated purposes of your plan.

By the way, here I'm playing Devil's advocate. I'm all in favor of your plan, but would want to hash it out a bit more. Just based on my experiences, the money left in small amounts, but I would definitely be interested in seeing the numbers behind your theory.