Author: CorruptionLedger

A complaint was unsealed this morning in federal court in Brooklyn charging Anatoly Legkodymov, a Russian national and senior executive of Bitzlato Ltd. (Bitzlato), a Hong Kong-registered cryptocurrency exchange, with conducting a money transmitting business that transported and transmitted illicit funds and that failed to meet U.S. regulatory safeguards, including anti-money laundering requirements. Legkodymov was arrested last night in Miami and is scheduled to be arraigned this afternoon in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. French…

Vietnamese President Nguyen Xuan Phuc resigned Tuesday, becoming the most senior member of the government to step down after a series of high-profile corruption scandals for which he was held responsible. The state Vietnam News Agency reported that he had resigned at a session of the ruling Communist Party’s Central Committee that was held “to consider and give opinions on Comrade Nguyen Xuan Phuc’s wish to stop holding positions, quit work and retire.” The language of the announcement strongly suggested…

On January 3, 2023, an Illinois state court entered a preliminary approval order for a settlement of nearly $300,000 in a class action lawsuit against Whole Foods for claims that the company violated the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (“BIPA”). The plaintiffs alleged that Whole Foods unlawfully collected voiceprints from employees who worked at the company’s distribution centers.  In the case in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Illinois, Chancery Division, the plaintiffs alleged that, by requiring them to use…

A Texas military contractor pleaded guilty on Jan. 12 to rigging bids on public military contracts in the state of Texas. According to court documents, Aaron Stephens, 53, conspired with others to rig bids on certain government contracts from May 2013 to January 2018 in order to give the false impression of competition and to secure government payments in excess of $17.2 million. The plea agreement detailed six contracting bids that Stephens and his co-conspirators rigged, which included work performed…

Italy’s No. 1 fugitive, a Mafia boss convicted of helping to mastermind some of the nation’s most heinous slayings, was arrested Monday when he sought treatment at a private clinic in Sicily after three decades on the run. Matteo Messina Denaro was tried in absentia and convicted of dozens of murders, including helping to mastermind, along with other Cosa Nostra bosses, a pair of 1992 bombings that killed top anti-Mafia prosecutors — and led the Italian state to stiffen its…

The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected a bid by NSO Group to block a WhatsApp lawsuit accusing the Israeli tech firm of allowing mass cyberespionage of journalists and human rights activists. The Supreme Court denied NSO’s plea for legal immunity and ruled that the case, which targets the company’s Pegasus software, can continue in a California federal court, a court filing showed. Pegasus gives its government customers — which have allegedly included Mexico, Hungary, Morocco and India — near-complete access…

More than 70,000 staff at 150 universities across the UK will strike for 18 days between February and March in disputes over pay, working conditions and pensions, the University and College Union (UCU) said on Thursday. “The clock is now ticking for the sector to produce a deal or be hit with widespread disruption throughout spring,” UCU general secretary Jo Grady said. The union, which represents academics, trainers, librarians and professional staff in colleges and universities, said it was demanding…

LOS ANGELES – A Tarzana man pleaded guilty today to federal criminal charges for running a nearly $6 million scheme in which he knowingly sold used skin-tightening medical devices that were deliberately misbranded as new, as well as counterfeit devices that he claimed were to be used with fat-reducing laser machines. Kambiz Youabian, 49, pleaded guilty to a two-count information charging him with mail fraud and introducing a misbranded medical device into interstate commerce. According to his plea agreement, Youabian…

A federal district court in San Diego ordered today that over $17 million in restitution be distributed to approximately 800 victims from over 40 different countries due to their investment losses in BitConnect, a massive cryptocurrency investment scheme, which defrauded thousands of investors worldwide. On Sept. 16, 2021, Glenn Arcaro, 44, the top U.S.-based promoter for BitConnect, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Separately, on Feb. 25, 2022, the founder of BitConnect, Satish Kumbhani, was indicted for his…

Britain’s government stood accused Wednesday of actively undermining talks with union leaders in a bid to encourage strike action and depress workers’ wages across the economy. The government was hoping for a public backlash, to justify newly introduced legislation that would force unions to provide a “minimum service” in public sectors, railway union leaders said. The allegation came as ambulance drivers and paramedics staged another walkout, prompting warnings of serious risk to the public — part of a wave of…

ABC Polymer Industries LLC pleaded guilty yesterday to a willful violation of an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standard that caused a worker’s death. The charge involves an Aug. 16, 2017, incident at the Helena, Alabama, plant owned by ABC Polymer Industries LLC, in which a worker was pulled into a cluster of unguarded moving rollers and killed. U.S. District Judge Annemarie Carney Axon for the Northern District of Alabama accepted the plea. According to court documents, ABC Polymer…

A court in Romania’s capital Bucharest has upheld the 30-day arrest of divisive social media personality and self-described misogynist Andrew Tate on charges of organized crime, human trafficking and rape, an official said late Tuesday. Ramona Bolla, a spokesperson for Romanian anti-organized crime agency DIICOT, said the court rejected an appeal by Tate against a judge’s earlier decision to extend his arrest from 24 hours to 30 days. Tate, 36, a British-U.S. citizen who has 4.5 million followers on Twitter,…

Allen Weisselberg, a longtime executive for Donald Trump and the star prosecution witness in the criminal trial of the former president’s real estate company, was sentenced on Tuesday to five months behind bars for helping engineer a wide-ranging tax fraud at the Trump Organization. Weisselberg, 75, was expected to be sent to New York’s notorious Rikers Island jail after pleading guilty last August to all 15 counts he faced in an agreement with prosecutors. The Trump Organization’s former chief financial…

U.S. Supreme Court justices on Tuesday wrestled with a labor dispute that could narrow federal protections for unions by making it easier for employers to sue over strikes that result in damage to company property. The justices heard oral arguments in an appeal by a concrete business in Washington state called Glacier Northwest Inc of a lower court’s ruling in favor of a local affiliate of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in the company’s lawsuit against the union arising from…

The Chinese embassy in South Korea has suspended issuing short-term visas for South Korean visitors, it said on Tuesday, the first retaliatory move against nations imposing COVID-19 curbs on travellers from China. The embassy will adjust the policy subject to the lifting of South Korea’s “discriminatory entry restrictions” against China, it said on its official WeChat account. A Chinese embassy official confirmed the new measures. The announcement comes a day after Foreign Minister Qin Gang expressed concern about the restrictions…

  U.S. Department of Justice FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Wednesday, January 4, 2022 Pennsylvania-based medical device distributor Jet Medical Inc. (Jet) agreed to pay $200,000 to resolve criminal allegations relating to a migraine headache treatment, and Jet and two related companies agreed to pay another $545,000 in a civil settlement involving the same device. In a criminal information filed today in the Southern District of Illinois, the government alleged that between April 2014 and April 2019, Jet introduced into interstate commerce devices…