Webinar 28/2021 'An added value in fighting serious crimes: A step by step approach towards a money laundering conviction without proving the underlying predicate offence'

Tuesday 30 November at 10:00 CET

OBJECTIVES

The ultimate goal of most criminals committing serious crimes is financial gain. As incarceration is the calculated risk of these criminals the identification and the confiscation of illicit proceeds are the means of real deterrence and disruption of organised crime. The traditional enforcement logic requires first to identify and duly investigate the original or associated crime as that is the source of criminal revenue. Once the predicate offence – such as drug trafficking, human trafficking, smuggling of goods, fraud, facilitation of illegal immigration etc. – is revealed, authorities in parallel shall investigate the flow of criminal wealth. According to the traditional enforcement approach it is crucial to prove the link between the predicate offence and the alleged criminal revenue to secure conviction and confiscation.

As organised crime groups resort to other type of crimes and techniques related to cyber, encryption and the dark web, as well as the use of underground banking, covert financial structures, virtual currencies and concealment of illicit revenues in the flow of trade the detection of illegal money flows is now a considerably complex task. The linkage of associated crime and money laundering is even more blurred by the tendency that the money laundering process is outsourced to third parties, specialised crime groups that have nothing to do with the original crime. In this scheme money laundering is offered as a service by professionals that are active in the grey or white zone of the economy having expertise in corporate, financial and tax law and possess business structures that can be utilised for cleaning criminal proceeds in large amounts.

From police perspective it is crucial to focus the scarcely available operational resources to detect these new crimes, new type of criminals and disrupt these money laundering groups that serve, facilitate several other criminal groups by offering money laundering services. Therefore it is critical to be able to secure a money laundering conviction without evidencing the predicate offence which may be unknown.

The overall objective of this webinar is to understand these developments and bolster the fight against serious crimes by the use of a money laundering investigation and to discuss possible ways to execute a money laundering investigation without proving the predicate offence. This will be demonstrated by the applied practice of Dutch law enforcement and Dutch prosecution service concerning these stand-alone money laundering investigations.

TARGET GROUP

Law enforcement and judicial officers specialised in combating serious crimes (e.g. drug trafficking, human trafficking, smuggling of goods etc.) and also those who are specialised in combating money laundering, economic and financial crime, financial intelligence, tax and other fraud schemes. Officials working for police, customs, judiciary, FIU and tax administrations are all welcome.