Practice at Laundering Money
This was fun – oh my gosh this was fun!
Every so often we challenge each other in the office to see how good our skills can be in the dark arts. This month challenge was to launder money. Since there was no predicate crime it was not actually laundering money – but you’ll see how easy it was.
Purchased from Craig’s List – a discounted Home Depot card value of $120 purchased for $90.00.
Bought $500 of merchandise for $500 ± at Kohl’s – gave receipt and merchandise to someone else in the office and they retuned it and got all of the money back.
Purchased an expensive bike ($4,800 retail) for a discounted fee ($2,200), gave it to someone else in the office and they sold it for more ($2,400) than what was paid for the bike.
All of these methods can be amped up to an industrial level moving goods and equipment and swapping forms of currency and monetary instruments until the mind whirls. Once can even buy a number of stored value cards – aka gift cards and start using them as means of payment of bills and gratuities etc…
One scheme we uncovered was a small town politician fixing votes on zoning. He took no money himself but kept a very close track of how many gift cards his children at college were sent. A smart scheme until one of the property developers went bust. When the developer was going through the debtors examination in his CH 7 bankruptcy he was accused of stealing over $30,000 over 4 years in gift cards. His answer to the charge was breathtakingly simple – he produced a ledger of all of the cards purchased, for what reason, for what project, for which of the politician’s children they were purchased. The developer further stated that his bankruptcy was directly tied to a project where the politician was unable to fix the vote and thus the developer lost a significant some of money
It goes to the old adage that corruption only works if both are happy and prosperous.
This is just an awareness matter for you the business person to watch for in your commercial life.
As always my class on how to Launder Money is at the original Raffle’s Bar by appointment only – bring cash.
