US Court Charges Two Ex-Officials in Mexico's Ruling Party with Fraud Jared Taylor - Reuters
go to original November 29, 2013

A U.S. court has charged two ex-officials from Mexico's ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) with fraud, theft and illegal transfer of funds, after U.S. authorities seized millions of dollars the men are believed to have stolen.

The four-count indictment in U.S. District Court in Texas against Hector Javier Villarreal, former finance secretary in Coahuila state, and Jorge Torres, an ex-interim governor, which was unsealed on Wednesday, marks the first criminal charges in the United States against the pair.

Both men served in the 2005-2011 Coahuila government of Humberto Moreira, who was an ally of President Enrique Pena Nieto before he won the presidential election of 2012.

Moreira gave way to Torres as governor to become chairman of the PRI while the party was still in opposition. But he stepped down in disgrace at the end of 2011 after it was revealed he had left Coahuila badly in debt.

Villarreal and Torres are suspected of laundering more than $2 million each to bank accounts in Bermuda and lying about where the money came from, Kenneth Magidson, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas, said in a statement.

U.S. prosecutors accuse the men of using bank accounts in Texas to funnel embezzled funds to Bermuda.

Read the rest at Reuters

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