International Crime Scholar Pleads Guilty in Money-Laundering Case

A identified global scholar on drug cartels and money laundering has pleaded guilty to money laundering more than his involvement in a Venezuelan bribery and corruption plan.

Bruce Bagley, a professor at the College of Miami, admitted that, involving November 2017 and October 2018, his company’s lender account received somewhere around $two.5 million from the abroad accounts controlled by a sanctioned Columbian businessman.

Bagley was arrested in November 2019 and pleaded not guilty at the time however, he submitted a recognize in March indicating that he prepared to alter his plea.

He is the creator of the book “Drug Trafficking, Organized Crime, and Violence in the Americas Today.”

“Bruce Bagley … went from creating the book on crime — virtually creating a book on drug trafficking and organized crime — to committing crimes,” the United States Lawyer for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman, reported in a press launch. “Professor Bagley admitted right now to laundering money for corrupt overseas nationals — the proceeds of bribery and corruption, stolen from the citizens of Venezuela. Bagley now faces the chance of a extended tenure in prison.”

According to court docket files, Bagley received monthly payments from a corrupt meals firm operate by a Columbian businessman, considering that discovered as Alex Saab. Bagley transferred the money to lender accounts controlled by a U.S. regulation enforcement informant, Jorge Luis Hernandez, while preserving a share for himself.

Saab was sanctioned very last calendar year by the U.S. Treasury Division allegedly profiting from a no-bid agreement to import meals to Venezuela. He was indicted in Miami in July for laundering money linked to a general public housing software in Venezuela.

“I should really have understood that the money involved had been proceeds of illegal activity,” Bagley reported in a federal court docket listening to.

Bagley has been on administrative leave at the College of Miami considering that very last slide.

His sentencing is scheduled for October 1.

Bruce Bagley, corruption, Cash laundering, Venezuela