MIAMI (Reuters) - U.S. federal authorities are investigating millions of dollars contributed by accused fraudster Allen Stanford and his staff to U.S. lawmakers over the past decade, the Miami Herald reported on Sunday.
The newspaper said the Justice Department investigation aimed to determine whether the banker received special favors from politicians while he was operating his alleged $7 billion Ponzi scheme centered on fraudulent certificates of deposit issued by his offshore bank in Antigua and Barbuda.
The Miami Herald said an email sent to Stanford by Texas Republican Representative Pete Sessions on the day authorities announced fraud charges against the billionaire financier, as well as $2.3 million in contributions he made to Sessions and other U.S. lawmakers, were "part of the government's inquiry."
It said Stanford, who has pleaded not guilty and is awaiting a trial set for January 2011, also spent $5 million on lobbying since 2001, and successfully lobbied in 2001 to kill a bill that would have exposed the flow of millions into his secretive offshore bank on the Caribbean island of Antigua.
The following year he helped block legislation that would have led to more government scrutiny of his now disgraced Antigua bank, the newspaper said. ...
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It said Stanford also funded Caribbean trips for a group of U.S. lawmakers known as the Caribbean Caucus, including Sessions and Democrats Gregory Meeks of New York and Donald Payne of New Jersey. The newspaper said most of the members of Congress contacted it contacted about their ties to Stanford declined to discuss them, other than to say they had returned the contributions. Prosecutors say Stanford paid tens of thousands of dollars in bribes for years to a top financial regulator in Antigua and Barbuda to shield his Ponzi scheme from U.S. investigators. ...
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