NCJ Number
138562
Date Published
1992
Length
29 pages
Annotation
The U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) conducted a study focusing on the Department of the Treasury's Office of Financial Enforcement (OFE), which processes civil penalty referrals for violations of the Bank Secrecy Act which prohibits money laundering. The report analyzed OFE's civil penalty workload, the time OFE takes to process civil penalty referrals, and various case studies of both open and closed cases. Information was gathered from statistical reports provided by OFE's case tracking system.
Abstract
The GAO study showed that civil penalty referrals received by the Department of the Treasury's OFE decreased 85 percent between 1986 and 1991. Of the 421 cases closed since 1985, 11 percent resulted in a penalty assessment; however, the number of penalties assessed has declined steadily. The GAO report found that civil penalty referrals were not processed in a timely manner. OFE had a backlog of 220 civil penalty cases as of January 1990; the backlog was attributed to staff shortfalls, inadequate written procedures, and insufficient priority given to processing the cases. Many government officials interviewed for this study believed that lengthy processing times may decrease the number of referrals made. The report noted that OFE has changed its tracking system and implemented new policies designed to improve its management and processing of civil penalty referrals. 3 tables, 4 figures, and 3 appendixes