Follow the money, honey

Speaking of Haiti...

Records show more than 1,300 Trump condos were purchased through shell companies, which allow buyers to shield their finances and identities, and without a mortgage, which protects buyers from lender inquiries.

Those two characteristics raise alarms about possible money laundering, according to statements issued in recent months by the Department of Treasury, which has investigated transactions just like those all over the country.

[...]

Trump companies reportedly sold $35 million in real estate last year alone — mostly to secretive shell companies that open the president up to possible influence peddling.

  Raw Story

AND money laundering.

According to the Buzzfeed News report, the Haitian government complained in the 1980s that former dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier laundered money stolen from the Caribbean nation’s treasury by purchasing an apartment in Trump Tower.

Duvalier, nicknamed “Baby Doc,” was overthrown in 1986, but three years earlier used a Panamanian shell company called Lasa Trade and Finance to buy apartment 54-K in Trump’s Manhattan tower for $446,875 cash.

Trump, the future U.S. president, signed the deed of sale.

A copy of which is no doubt in Mr. Mueller's files.

Federal prosecutors charged a Russian native in 1984 with laundering the proceeds from a gasoline bootlegging operation through five Trump Tower condos purchased for $4.9 million.

David Bogatin pleaded guilty in 1987 and served eight years in federal prison.

And how did Trump get off?

Trump Taj Mahal casino was charged under anti-money laundering regulations 106 times in 1990 and 1991 by failing to identify gamblers who bought or cashed out more than $10,000 in chips.

Those reports are required to help authorities identify gamblers who may be laundering money, and Trump’s casino paid a $477,000 fine to the Treasury Department in 1998 without admitting wrongdoing.

MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” hosted Time deputy managing editor Michael Duffy, who wrote the magazine’s cover story this week on Trump’s first year in office, and USA Today senior politics reporter Heidi Przybyla asked him about the president’s business dealings.

[...]

“There could be explanations for this, like people just don’t want their names identified with Trump properties,” she said. “But according to our reporters, there’s a lot of people who say these could be used for influence buying, influence-seeking groups including foreign people who have purchased these properties if we’re able to identify.”

Duffy said the president had already tipped off investigators about how much influence peddling could be going on.

“President Trump told, warned special counsel (Robert) Mueller not to look at his family finances which, of course, was a great big red flag to go ahead and look at his family finances,” Duffy said. [...] "I think the family’s finances will move front and center this year.”

  aAw Story

I wonder how you pronounce that woman's name.

Yes, shell companies can ge legitimate, but Baby Doc's cash purchases definitely weren't.  But the Baby was friends with powerful people in the US.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Plans to Reinstate Our Baby Continue Apace

Former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier will face trial for corruption but not for human rights abuses, the judge handling the case said on Monday.

[...]

Victims of Duvalier's armed forces and the notorious National Security Volunteer Militia, better known as the Tonton Macoutes, sought to have their claims included in the official case against Duvalier, but the government prosecutor's office did not include them in its recommendations to the judge as the alleged abuses fell outside the statute of limitations stipulated in Haiti's constitution, according to a senior judicial official.

The government prosecutor also recommended dropping the corruption charges, the official said, but the judge decided to let them stand.

[...]

A 20-page ruling on the charges was delivered to the government prosecutor's office on Monday, Carves Jean, the judge responsible for investigating the case, told Reuters.

It does not include charges for the murders, disappearances, torture and other rights abuses allegedly committed during Duvalier's 15-year rule.

"I did not find enough legal grounds to keep human rights charges and crimes against humanity against him," he said. "Now my job is over. The case is no longer in my hands."

  UK Guardian

He said as he hurried out to deposit his new American dollars into his Swiss bank account.

The Swiss government has sought to confiscate assets valued at 5.8m Swiss francs (£4m). It wants to return the funds to Haiti, which is the poorest country in the Americas and is struggling to recover from an earthquake in 2010 that killed more than 200,000 people.

Whoa! Strike that…deposit them in his US bank account.

Last week, President Michel Martelly was quoted as favouring a pardon for Duvalier but he later retracted his remarks.

After Bill Clinton went back home.

Since then, Duvalier dines frequently in some of the city's finest restaurants, accompanied by former members of his regime. He has also made unauthorised visits outside the capital.

[He] even managed a handshake with an unsuspecting former US president Bill Clinton at an event outside the capital to mark the second anniversary of the 2010 earthquake.

Unsuspecting? I think not.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Meanwhile in Haiti

Lost amidst the heart-wrenching stories and photographs of the “poor Haitians” living in squalor and misery circulating on the second anniversary of the 12 January 2010 earthquake, another set of images appeared. Few people noticed these other images – they received little attention in the mainstream media – but they offer an insight into the prospects for Haiti’s reconstruction and, indeed, into the prospects for Haiti’s political and economic future.

The images were taken during the official commemoration ceremonies at the hillside of Titanyen [pdf], north of Port-au-Prince, where former dictators Jean Claude Duvalier and his father, Francois Duvalier, discarded the bodies of their political opponents. After the earthquake, it became the gravesite of thousands of unidentified earthquake victims. During the ceremonies, local delegates and international diplomats paid their respects to the Haitians that lost their lives and pledged to help those who lived. But the most striking image that emerged during the ceremonies was that of an immoral triumvirate. Rubbing shoulders on stage, shaking hands and exchanging pleasantries were Haitian President Michel Martelly, former US President and UN Special Envoy, Bill Clinton, and, Jean Claude Duvalier.

  Black Agenda Report

Wait a minute…Jean Claude Duvalier? Baby Doc? The mass murdering former dictator???

The Obama administration’s relative silence around the return of Duvalier needs to be contrasted with the noise it made while it forcefully tried to prevent the return of Jean Bertrand Aristide, Haiti’s first democratically elected President. [...]Let’s remember that under Duvalier (and his father, Francois) nearly 50,000 Haitians were killed, disappeared, and tortured by the reviled tonton macoutes, his private army. At the same time, Duvalier embezzled hundreds of millions of dollars, most of which sponsored an exiled life of grandeur. Despite the calls for his arrest and prosecution by Haitian survivors, lawyers, and international human rights organizations, Duvalier has been allowed to roam Haiti’s streets, even dining at the finest restaurants with the likes of Sean Penn.

WTF?

But Duvalierism was also good for US politics and economics. In the 1960s, they needed Francois (“Papa Doc”) Duvalier to offset the rise of revolutionary communist Cuba. Under Jean Claude (“Baby Doc”), they were able to open up the Haitian markets and resources to US businesses, expand sweatshops, and lay the basis for the coming neoliberal economic policies. This is where the US-selected President Martelly and “Papa” Bill Clinton come in. As we’ve pointed out here on Black Agenda Report, right-wing candidate Martelly was handpicked by the Obama administration to become Haiti’s president in a forced election marred by irregularities and low voter turn out. More importantly, he is the face – and backbone – of a resurgent Duvalierism. His Duvalier affinities are well known as is his animus towards former President Aristide. He has historic ties with Duvalier loyalists, has called for “amnesty” for Duvalier, and is now in the process of reestablishing the Haitian army.

[...]

As the U.S. attempts to consolidate its military presence in the Western hemisphere, control of Haiti is important. For many, this is one of the reasons explaining Haiti’s currently military occupation by the UN-led criminal force, MINUSTAH, the largest UN military force in a country that is not at war. It is also the reason for the massive new US embassy in Haiti, the fourth largest US embassy in the world.

Wonderful.

I really wonder sometimes if the universe hasn’t already begun its retraction and we are now going in reverse.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.