If this is true, it is crime at the highest levels, involving Venezuelan oil, the government of Puerto Rico, PREPA, and Puerto Rico’s FBI office and U.S. Attorney:
Richard Lawless, CEO of Commercial Solar Power, Inc., a company that was reportedly forced into bankruptcy by actions of the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), which has been used to redirect as much as $100 million a year from the people of Puerto Rico to select government officials, asks, Did FBI and Justice Dept. Enable Puerto Rico’s Financial Meltdown? The FBI and DOJ stood by while government officials in Puerto Rico committed $11 billion dollars in financial fraud
On February 24, 2015, a private lawsuit was filed using the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), claiming government officials at PREPA stole over one billion dollars in public money over 10 years and committed one of the largest municipal bond frauds in United States history.
Allegedly, the CIA started paying attention (emphasis added),
Some months ago, I received a call from a man stating he worked for the U.S. government, inferring he was with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
I was told that Puerto Rico came on his agency’s radar years ago because the head of the PREPA fuel purchase office started making direct calls to the then-president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. An agency listened in and found out that PREPA was buying sludge oil from Venezuela and billing the utility for high grade oil. The difference in value—hundreds of millions per year (today it would be $700 million a year and is said to be still going on)—was allegedly kicked back to the fuel office manager and distributed to politicians and government officials on the island.
As the unnamed government agency continued to listen in on the calls, the caller claimed it became clear that family members of Puerto Rican FBI agents and family members in the Puerto Rico U.S. Attorney’s office were receiving payments based on these “kickbacks.”
He went on to tell me that the Puerto Rico’s FBI office and U.S. Attorney will do nothing about the oil kickback scheme and the bond rating scheme because they were participating in it.
Then there were the bonds,
Investors allowed PREPA to issue bonds. Then, PREPA borrowed from private banks to pay the bond’s interests, then borrowed from the Government Development Bank (GDB) to pay back the private bank loans. The GDB, in turn, issued more bonds to refinance all. Afterwards, PREPA would issue a new debt to pay GDB’s outstanding interests, pay principal and pre-pay the new bonds’ interests for several years—a cycle that is repeated over and over—and in which the original debt is never paid, the report outlined.
“This practice could constitute a fraud scheme for which the federal agencies that regulate financial instruments and the Security Exchange Commission could take action against and/or pursue civil suits against these institutions,” the report concluded.
Here’s the 23-page legislative report Lawless refers to. Additionally,
On Monday, a senior source in a related U.S. government agency, speaking toCaribbean News Now on condition of anonymity, confirmed almost word for wordwhat I had apparently been told.
As Drudge says, developing.
