Wednesday, December 29, 2021

Sam Cooper's Seven Questions...

HockeyBagsFullOfCash
'RUsVille


Sam Cooper, working for Global, has written a fantastic year end summary of all the major issues that have come up during Lotusland's money-laundering inquiry headed by Justice Austin Cullen.

Mr. Cooper also poses seven questions that he believes Mr. Cullen needs to answer in his final report, which will likely come out in the late spring.

They are:
Did former B.C. gaming minister Rich Coleman ignore credible warnings from his subordinates that suspected drug-money laundering was growing exponentially in B.C. casinos?

Did former B.C. premier Christy Clark receive the same alerts as Coleman and other gaming and financial ministers who reported to her?

Did executives at the BC Lottery Corporation allow highly suspicious cash transactions to continue in their casinos because the transactions resulted in higher government revenue and pay bonuses?

Did the private operators of B.C. casinos pressure the Lottery Corp. to refrain from banning high-rolling patrons who were suspected by casino investigators of being drug traffickers?

Were RCMP investigations of casino money laundering in B.C. discouraged by the provincial government or hindered by a lack of federal funding?

Were the alerts, including reports on suspicious transactions at the big five Canadian banks and law firms, from Canada’s anti-money laundering watchdog Fintrac ineffective in triggering regulation and police investigations?

Were casino and real estate loans connected to B.C. gangs and involving B.C. court cases used to facilitate the growth of underground banking from China into Canada?


Personally, I hope that Mr. Cullen answers YES, empatically, to all seven of Mr. Cooper's questions.

More realistically, I reckon that the the early betting line on the over-under is likely closer to 2.5.


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13 comments:

NVG said...

your two links are broken.
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search criteria for more info : sean holman, gambling, bc, Laila Yuile

Lew said...

Those questions arose from Sam Cooper’s work, and were on the table before Cullen started his inquiry. In fact they are the reason an inquiry was required. That and the fact BC’s Attorneys General past and present didn’t conduct their own inquiry despite having an obvious duty to do so.

It is possible that the current Attorney General believed that those he would have relied upon to conduct the investigation were conflicted in some manner and therefore went to a public inquiry instead. His culpability in burying skeletons left in other closets used by the BC Liberals leave one to wonder, however. It reduces the benefit of doubt he could otherwise be afforded.

Since the answer to all seven questions is obviously the same as any damn fool knows when asked if bears do their business in the woods, Justice Cullen will need to be the wordsmith equivalent of an Olympic gymnast to come up with even one “no”.

Either way, we will soon see what makes Mr. Eby tick.



Anonymous said...

Being far too generous with the praise for Cooper.

No mention of the fact that a final report was due on December 15, 2020.

Enormous parts of this story have been avoided at all cost, both by Cullen and Cooper. It's so reminiscent of the Missing Women's Inquiry that almost expected to see Wally take over.

Absolutely no serious investigation has taken place for a decade, if ever.

This was not an enquiry but a masonic cover-up operation from the get-go.

Coleman gets to hold the bag but nothing gets done about it; and the dirty biz goes on like always in this infernal province.

RossK said...

Thanks NVG - fixed the blogger-induced gremlins (again)

_____
All points well taken, as usual,Lew--

I always assumed that the current AG did have concerns about conflicts biases within his shop and thus went 'independent'. I hope I'm not wrong about that.

_____
Anon-Above--

What, specifically, troubles you about Mr. Cooper's reporting?


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Corruption Too Big To Be Dealt With said...

Not wanting this to become about Cooper, We will only say the following:

--Involvement of the big banks never mentioned. The key to the whole laundromat is to move large amounts of dirty funds into the legitimate financial system--and that doesn't happen unless the bankers approve of it. Just try moving 5-figures worth of currency and see if a banker can be avoided.

--Neither Hell's Angels nor the Cartels ever mentioned, let alone investigated. Where do people think all those 20-dollar bills were coming from--?

--Complete black-out by corporate media went on for years. None of this malfeasance can go on for so long unless the corporate media monopoly willfully ignores it for years. And now we're supposed to believe that Cooper rises from those same ashes and begins doing the job honestly. Not once did he dare walk across the room (lodge) and ask von Poncer where he was on this corruption for the last 20 years. Not once. Because they're pledged brothers who've taken an oath to keep secrets for each other.

--Setting up blind trusts by "certain" lawyers/firms has always been skirted around like a bloody car accident. Cooper is just the latest iteration of the useful gate-keeper preventing this sort of thing from getting into the public realm.

--FinTrac has been M.I.A. since its founding; and yet Cooper studiously manages to over-look their 3-blind-mice routine all the time.

--R.C.M.P. brass given a pass for decades and Cooper has done nothing to change this cozy cover.

Let's just be honest with ourselves: Cooper is just the latest media.corp$(e) point man, the apprentice if you will, in what is another in a long list of parliamentary slow-walks into a limited hang-out. Surely no one really thinks that Corus (or that shady foreign hedge fund that owns them) is going to let Cooper get to the bottom of what-all has been going down in the back rooms of power in this province. He doesn't strike me as the suicidal type; and we all know how expensive it is to live in this place.

Cheers.

Lew said...

@ Corruption Too Big To Be Dealt With,

Your denigration of Sam Cooper leads me to ask whether you’ve read his book “Wilful Blindness”? If so, which specific parts of it do you find deficient in regard to your statements above? And if not, why not?

RossK said...

Same questions from me as Lew Anon-o-Corruption...

So Easy To Lose Sight Of The Real Problem said...

Let us just say the following:

1) Have not read "Wilful Blindness;" but will do so for sure.

2) Criticism is being directed at Cooper acting in his role as a journalist, not as a long-form non-fiction writer.

3) Refuse to make too much of Cooper's role in all of this rot; although he does have one. Instead, we would much rather read/hear in the media corp$(e) where the issues above were seriously explored for the public to ponder.

4) Our hope for a genuine analysis into what really happened also extends to anyone else around here who thinks that they (or Cooper) have something more to offer which has not been put forth in the media.

NVG said...

"Where do people think all those 20-dollar bills were coming from--?"

Government of Canada!

Lew said...

“Refuse to make too much of Cooper's role in all of this rot; although he does have one.”

Name a journalist who has played a more significant role.

“Instead, we would much rather read/hear in the media corp$(e) where the issues above were seriously explored for the public to ponder.”

Seems to me that when an investigative journalist stands out from the rest hereabouts he or she should be encouraged to keep up the good work, not accused of not doing enough. Mr. Cooper’s work even before he wrote the book did a lot to prompt a public inquiry, the results of which we now await. I dare say it may not have been called but for his public expositions. He is also currently working the ref on our behalf as evidenced by his directed questions.

There are plenty of moribund “journalists”, politicians, and law enforcement entities about that deserve ridicule for not fulfilling their duty to the public on this and many other files. We should be attacking them, not one of the very few that has been shining light where it needs to be.


“Our hope for a genuine analysis into what really happened also extends to anyone else around here who thinks that they (or Cooper) have something more to offer which has not been put forth in the media.”

The public inquiry was the perfect forum for that. If the inquiry turns out to be a dud, those who share the blame will stand exposed. Sam Cooper will not be among them.


Anonymous said...

Has any PEP politician net worth increased in past 20 years?.

e.a.f. said...

Now as I recall Sam Cooper was writing articles about the money laundering for the Vancouver Sun, but not until the B.C. Lieberals were out of office. Then I noticed he referred to "the government", which by that time was the NDP.

Others were writing about this prior to Cooper.

So the betting is about what will the report by Cullen say and who if any one will be to blame. I'd be surprised if it says much at all about the B.C. Lieberals and their friends. It certainly won't say much about the H.A.'s involvement in the drug trade--they franchised it, hence the gang wars, its just about market share amongst the franchisees. Might blame China and the real estate industry. Banks will be left alone.

Given a lot of this went on at one casino in /Richmond, my question has always been, where were the Richmond RCMP in all of this, given people who went to that casino, stopped, it was just too wierd for them.

Hockey bags with cash and no one paid attention.......too many people were making money so who was going to stop that.

What will Eby do? Quess we're going to find out.

There is an old joke; why don't sharks eat lawyers? Professional courtesy. Well politics is not too different Parties will snipe at each other, but for the really big stuff, they won't toss too much dirt around. next time it could be them, professional courtesy.

Crankypants said...

EAF

Your last paragraph may be more appropriate if you substitute "professional courtesy" with "survival of the institution or gravy train". These various parties may portray themselves as opponents for public consumption but tend to have each other's backs when push comes to shove.

The report will come out, Eby will hold a presser with a lot of verbiage and little substance and life will go on.