Organized crime reporters recount investigations into Missouri casinos, money laundering

Corruption combines with incompetence in allowing international crime organizations to launder billions of dollars of dirty money, leaders of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project on Thursday told University of Missouri journalism students.

Drew Sullivan and Paul Radu spoke in the Reynolds Journalism Institute. The OCCRP is one of the Missouri School of Journalism's Medal of Honor recipients. The other is Linda Rutherford, Southwest Airlines Chief Administration and Communications Officer. They were to receive their medals in a Thursday night ceremony at the Atrium.

The organization partnered with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists on the Panama Papers investigation of offshore finance operations.

"There's no world policemen," said Sullivan, a graduate of MU. "The only natural enemy of organized crime is investigative reporters."

When Sullivan was a journalism student at MU, his career began, he said.

"There are casinos in Missouri now," he said. "I wonder if there are any connections to organized crime?"

He found them.

A project called "Crime Inc." looked at organized crime and its enablers and the criminal infrastructure.

They found a company that served as a ready-made money laundering system or organized crime, Radu said.

"You need volume," Radu said. "You need a Wal-Mart of organized crime."

A source who lost $500,000 buying Belarussian tires that weren't delivered tipped them off.

They met him in Europe, they said.

"Woody Allen said 90% of life is showing up," Sullivan said. "In reporting, it's really true."

A file of banking records found there were thousands of transfers to this unknown company totaling $1.5 billion, Sullivan said.

They found $160 billion a month flowing out of Russia into banks in Estonia, Lithuania and Ukraine, they said.

The corruption of the criminals paired with the incompetence of banks to allow the crimes to continue, they said.

"If they would really look carefully, they will lose the money," Sullivan said of the motivation of the banks. "Now we're all paying the cost of money laundering through higher bank fees."

An attorney in Austria laundering money for international criminals went to Austrian police telling them he thought his life was in danger. They told him he was on his own, they said.

"He kept on doing the business and hoping for the best," Sullivan said.

He was found dead in an Austrian forest.

"We are seeing plans to undermine states," Sullivan said. "An example is Hungary. Media is purchased or shut down. You basically undermine the election system and you propagandize the people."

Other countries undermined by organized crime are Serbia and Albania, Sullivan said.

"Romania has gone back and forth a few times," he said.

Politics also is involved, but it's politics of every brand, they said.

"Russians would look at Super PACS and say 'that's corruption,'" Sullivan said.

Politicians are motivated to find money for re-election, he said.

"Dozens of U.S. politicians are getting money from China, Russia and other state actors" through Super PACs, Sullivan said. "The problem is there's always impunity. It's fairly easy for this money to get into the system."

A former president is an enabler for organized crime, Sullivan said.

"Donald Trump has built apartments for organized crime," he said.

But it doesn't discriminate based on party affiliation.

"Don't get caught up in the politics of it," Sullivan said. "That doesn't matter. What matters is you follow the money."

Hedge funds are another way to move a lot of money, Sullivan said.

The investigations can be painstaking, Radu said.

"You can pull the thread from any corner and follow the money to find out where it leads," Radu said.

Banking records are only obtained through leaks and court cases, they said.

They pay close attention to security, with the biggest vulnerability smart phones, they said.

"In your most secure meetings, you take your phone for a walk," Sullivan said.

It involves giving your phone to a colleague while attending the meeting without it.

"I hate so say it, but we're becoming spies," he said.

Roger McKinney is the Tribune's education reporter. You can reach him at rmckinney@columbiatribune.com or 573-815-1719. He's on Twitter at @rmckinney9.

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project gives MU master class