E-Gold accused of money laundering
Doug Jackson, Reid A. Jackson and Barry K. Downey have been accused by the United States government of illegally operating e-gold, http://www.e-gold.com private digital gold currency. They operated in Melbourne after being indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington, DC. They are accused of running an unregulated financial network that dealt with criminals who launder illegal money.
Jeffrey Taylor, United States Attorney for the District of Columbia and another Department of Justice. Officials said they expect all three to surrender in Washington DC at a later date.
A four-count indictment was issued against E-Gold Ltd., Gold & Silver Reserve Inc., and owners Dr. Douglas L. Jackson, of Satellite Beach; Reid A. Jackson, of Melbourne; and Barry K. Downey of Woodbine, Maryland. Each was accused of conspiring to praise monetary instruments; conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmission business; operate an unlicensed money transmission business; and transmit money without a license in Washington, DC
The federal, state and local task force operated for two and a half years led by the US Secret Service in Orlando, along with the IRS, FBI and other state and local law enforcement agencies. Federal prosecutors obtained a short warrant and allegedly seized millions of dollars. That resulted in at least 58 account holders exposed and many thought they were criminals laundering illegal money through E-Gold operations and transactions.
“Douglas Jackson and his associates operated a sophisticated and extensive international money remittance business, without supervision or regulation from any entity in the world, allowing anonymous transfers of value with the click of a mouse,” said Taylor. “It is not surprising that criminals of all stripes turned to E-Gold as a place to move their money with impunity. As the indictment alleges, the defendants in this case knowingly allowed them to do so and benefited from its crimes “.
The indictment charged that the digital currency “EGold” functioned as an alternative payment system and was allegedly backed by stored physical gold. Charged that customers only needed to provide an email address to open an account and that no other customer information was verified. The indictment accused some customers of using fictitious names such as “Mickey Mouse”, “Donald Duck” and “No Name” and could conduct international transactions without any government regulation.
Because of that, it became a “highly favored payment method” by investment scammers, credit card and identity fraud thieves, and Internet peddlers of child pornography, authorities said.
A call to the offices of E-Gold and Gold & Silver Reserve, the founder denies the charges. Dr. Douglas Jackson, president and founder of E-Gold, speaking on behalf of his fellow directors and of both companies, strongly denies the charges, making special exception to allegations that either company turned a blind eye to payments. for child pornography or for the sale of stolen identity and credit card information.
Dr. Jackson stated: “With regard to child pornography, the government knows full well that its allegations are false, yet they highlight these irresponsible and deliberately damaging statements to demonize E-Gold in the public eye. During the Inquisition , Allegations of witchcraft and heresy were used to sanctify torture and property seizures. In the post-9/11 United States, child pornography and terrorism serve as indictments of choice. However, E-Gold, as a Incontrovertible fact, it is the most effective of all online payment systems in detecting and intercepting abuse of its payment system related to child pornography. E-Gold Ltd. is a founding member of the Financial Coalition of the National Center for Missing Children. and Exploited (NCMEC) to eliminate child pornography.
E-Gold is the only member institution that demonstrates with robust and auditable data a drastic reduction of such payments to practically zero, while billions of dollars of child pornography continue to flow through other (heavily regulated) payment systems. [Most members, that is, all the banks and credit card associations are utterly unable to even provide an estimate of the volume of such payments processed by their systems. eBay’s PayPal subsidiary, who may have the ability to make such a determination, has refused to do so and has indicated they destroy payment records after two years.] Worse, until August 2005, when NCMEC bravely broke ranks with US law enforcement agencies and began directly notifying E-Gold of criminal sites through CyberTipline, the component agencies. The US Department of Justice deliberately concealed their knowledge of child pornography abuses from E-Gold’s investigators, subordinating the fight against real crime to a political agenda designed to tarnish E-Gold. “
Click HERE to read Dr. Jackson’s full denial statement.