Gosh, I’m sure Los Angeles banks, who presumably receive some of this dirty drug money, never question why some businesses have so much cash to deposit. This is the real reason the drug trade continues. Dirty banks, crooked hedge funds, and sleazy investment banks need that drug money in exactly the same way a junkie needs the next fix.
Federal agents raided 70 Los Angeles businesses, including many in the fashion district on Wednesday, seizing $65 million in cash alleged to be from drug cartels. The businesses then, were no doubt just fronts. Their real purpose was to launder the money. Everything else was presumably to provide cover.
Bogus businesses can often be easily spotted. They never seem to have customers yet somehow manage stay in business. Thus, their overt business is not their actual business. Sue and I sometimes assume ourselves by guessing which empty storefront businesses are actually laundries.
“Los Angeles has become the epicenter of narco-dollar money laundering with couriers regularly bringing duffel bags and suitcases full of cash to many businesses,” Robert E. Dugdale, the assistant U.S. attorney in charge of federal criminal prosecutions here, said in a statement.