IMET

With Nortel verdict, RCMP's fraud unit racks up dismal conviction record

Topics: 
White-collar crime, RCMP, IMET, Anti-corruption efforts
Rating: 
3

Jeff Gray – January 14, 2013

The RCMP’s white-collar crime investigators announced criminal charges in two high-profile cases of alleged fraud in Toronto on the same day in 2008: One against former executives at the helm of Nortel Networks Corp., and the other targeting former executives of Royal Group Technologies Ltd.

These two high-profile cases were seen as signs that the Mounties’ Integrated Market Enforcement Teams (IMET) were finally starting to hook large fish and combatting Canada’s reputation as a place where corporate crimes went unpunished.

Interview with Bruce Livesey: Thieves of Bay Street

Topics: 
White-collar crime, OSC, Regulatory oversight, Financial industry, IMET, Audio
Rating: 
0

The Current – April 13, 2012

Bruce Livesey

Are we immune from a Wall Street style meltdown? A controversial book raises doubts that our banking and financial system is somehow morally superior and more secure than our American neighbours. It suggests that not only are Canada's Captains of the money industry capable of corruption, the system does little to protect you from them.

When the financial and real estate markets melted down in 2008, Canada's banks became super heroes. They were the envy of the world celebrated models of responsibility and prudence. It seemed to suggest the worst economic crisis in half-a-century demonstrated how lucky we were to have our financial futures invested in this country.

Book Review: Thieves of Bay Street, by Bruce Livesey

Topics: 
White-collar crime, Books, Regulatory oversight, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
3
Thieves of Bay Street

Alex Good – April 13, 2012

Thieves of Bay Street: How the Banks, Brokerages and the Wealthy Steal Billions from Canadians, by Bruce Livesey (Random House, 313 pages, $32 hardcover)

One thing we can thank the recent credit crisis and global financial meltdown for is the way it lifted the lid on a sector of the economy we hadn’t been giving enough attention.

That sector is the financial industry. In Thieves of Bay Street, investigative journalist Bruce Livesey looks at how Canada’s banks, brokerages, funds, and financial advisers have been ripping off Canadians for years. And while headline makers like Conrad Black and Earl Jones dominate Livesey’s chronicles of white collar crime, the not-so-few bad apples aren’t as important as the rotten barrel he describes.

Securities Enforcement Reform in Canada: If Not Now, When?

Topics: 
White-collar crime, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
3

Canadian News Wire – January 13, 2010

CFA Institute's Board Chair calls for effective Canadian securities enforcement to restore the public's trust in capital markets and the investment profession.

Margaret Franklin, CFA, chair of the Board of Governors of CFA Institute today called for fundamental changes to securities enforcement practices in Canada, including an overhaul of the RCMP's Integrated Enforcement Market Teams (IMET).

Solutions to market regulation faults sought

Topics: 
RCMP, White-collar crime, OSC, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
0

Tyler Hamilton – Dec 8, 2007

Ontario securities regulators and law-enforcement authorities are failing in their mission to protect investors.

A series of articles in the Toronto Star this week catalogued a quagmire of issues, from ill-equipped prosecutors and inexplicable delays to an overarching defeatist mentality that is sapping confidence from a fragmented system perceived as weak.

Richer rogues not on radar

Topics: 
RCMP, White-collar crime, OSC, Research, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
0

Tyler Hamilton – Dec 5, 2007

New study on corporate crime suggests system is stacked in favour of influential industry insiders

Regulators charged with pursuing insider traders and other market scammers tend to target small-time crooks and shy away from high-profile figures with deep pockets and powerful lawyers, according to a new study out of Queen's University.

Fraud squad lacking credibility

Topics: 
RCMP, White-collar crime, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
0

RCMP teams fighting white-collar crime stymied by poor leadership and complicated cases: Report

Madhavi Acharya-Tom Yew – Dec 4, 2007

The RCMP must make fighting stock market fraud a priority and overhaul the way it investigates these complex cases if it hopes to improve its track record on catching white-collar criminals, according to a report released yesterday.

The much-anticipated report comes from Nick Le Pan, a special adviser appointed by the federal government to get to the bottom of the troubles at the force's Integrated Market Enforcement Teams. The teams, created in Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto in 2003, were meant to crack down on high-profile stock market frauds and accounting scandals.

Why white-collar crime team fizzled

Topics: 
RCMP, White-collar crime, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
0

Madhavi Acharya-Tom Yew – Dec 2, 2007

Launched four years ago to clean up markets, police squad is now best known for its failures.

It was designed for show, an in-your-face warning in the heart of Canada's financial centre. Two dozen police, followed by a swarm of reporters and television crews, swept into the Bank of Nova Scotia at King and Bay armed with a search warrant. The bank itself was not under suspicion. It had been caught up in a probe surrounding another company, Royal Group Technologies Ltd.

A good country for crooks: Canada's losing war against white-collar crime

Topics: 
RCMP, White-collar crime, Financial industry, IMET
Rating: 
0

Two former top cops in the RCMP's elite IMET squads are blowing the whistle on a justice system that is losing the war on white-collar crime.

John Gray – September 24, 2007

Canada isn’t having much luck cleaning up its image as A country that is soft on white-collar crime. While Conrad Black faces up to 35 years in prison after his recent conviction in a Chicago courtroom, Canadian authorities are still licking their wounds after the recent acquittal of former Bre-X chief geologist John Felderhof on civil charges of insider trading.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Four years ago, the RCMP launched its Integrated Market Enforcement Teams, or IMETs, elite squads of investigators who were supposed to work together to crack down on white-collar crime. The results have been disappointing, to say the least. While the U.S. Justice Department has racked up more than 1,200 convictions against high-level executives and scammers in the past five years, the IMETs have managed just two — against the same person.

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