Compliance officers should contact federal investigators more frequently and more directly when they come across glaring instances of suspicious financial activity, say U.S. officials.
Border banks are accepting potentially fraudulent copies of cash declaration forms to justify bulk cash deposits by individuals traveling from Mexico into the United States, say law enforcement officials.
Federal examiners have uncovered "systemic breakdowns" at some banks in terms of how AML compliance policies are drafted to address subpoenas and law enforcement inquiries, said Suzanne Williams, manager of compliance in the banking supervision and regulation division at the Federal Reserve.
Nearly half of the members of the Council of Europe's anti-money laundering watchdog organization forward less than ten percent of their suspicious transaction reports to law enforcement agencies, the group said Friday.
Compliance officers may do well by borrowing from the pages of law enforcement agents and private investigators in performing due diligence on clients with offshore holdings, according to consultants.
If a bank releases too much or too little information or takes too long to respond to a request from law enforcement officials, an investigation might be bogged down or even compromised.
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