We know the phenomenon of mules who ingest drugs on behalf of drug traffickers, but there are also bank mules, responsible for opening bank accounts and creating shell companies, on behalf of serious crime. financial. The networks use these mules to complicate the work of investigators, and to make the circuit which allows money laundering, the result of various scams, very opaque.
Recently, a network suspected of having laundered 16.5 million euros was dismantled by the judicial police. A Frenchman in his forties, living in Israel, is suspected of having led this network. In connection with the local authorities, he was questioned at the end of November by investigators from the OCRGDF who went there. Extradition proceedings must be launched with a view to his indictment in France. This network laundered money from two major scams: fake transfer orders, and investment scams.
Online investment sites offer Internet users very promising returns provided they invest in dairy cows, whiskey, parking lots or even cryptocurrency. Completely bogus investment proposals underlines an investigator. But once you invest, you can’t get your money back.
It was then that very complex laundering circuits were put in place. Indispensable for setting up these very lucrative scams, bank mules are responsible for opening accounts and creating shell companies. “We could draw a parallel with the role of lookout in drug trafficking, because a bank mule is a small hand that will be used to open a bank account, explains Anne-Sophie Coulbois, director of the Central Office for the Suppression of Major Financial Crime (OCRDFG). It will be thanks to this account and the multitude of mules that organized criminal groups can make large-scale scams flourish while minimizing their criminal risk. “
According to Anne-Sophie Coulbois, these mules “are people who are often in a somewhat difficult economic situation and they will be paid a few hundred or even a few thousand euros to open these bank accounts while the scam will bring tens of thousands or even millions of euros to crooks. “
“Without them, the whole scheme of money laundering or the whole scheme of fraud falls through the cracks or in any case becomes extremely difficult to implement.”
Anne-Sophie Coulbois, Director of OCRDFGto franceinfo
These banking mules often think they are not taking risks. In reality, they can find themselves complicit in money laundering in an organized gang. “The use of these banking mules by organized criminal networks makes it possible to cut the links between the illegal flows and the swindler or the launderer, continues Anne-Sophie Coulbois. Only the identity of the bank mule will appear, the funds then circulate to accounts of other bank mules and it is very difficult to trace back to the final ordering party. “
This use of bank mules complicates the work of investigators, mules who specialize and can travel all over Europe to open accounts and fake companies. According to the financial markets authority, online investment scams represent losses estimated at 500 million euros per year for individuals.