Dirty money, dirty deals – an introduction
by Heiner Busch
The „fight“ against business crime and money laundering lives off an anti-capitalist rhetoric. What is forgotten however is that police and law enforcement agencies necessarily reach limits in this fight as well as not only acting against „white-collar-perpetrators“.

Learning from the ENRON scandal
by Andrea Böhm
The insolvency of Enron in December 2001 – until then the biggest bust in US company history – left behind debts of 40 billion US dollars. It marked the start of a series of accountancy and fraud scandals in major US firms. But only some of the manipulations by Enron managers were illegal. In the age of deregulation, stricter laws will not prevent similar scandals from happening in the future.

Penal consequences from the Berlin bank scandal
by Wolfgang Wieland
Since it became evident in Spring 2001 that the Berliner Bankgesellschaft (Berlin Bank Association) got itself into big trouble with their dodgy dealings, the already highly indebted Land of Berlin helped out with 1.8 billion Euro and took over debt guarantees worth billions for the bank’s funds. Now almost all of the former top management is under investigation, but not the members of the board of directors or the financial auditors. However, two years later, still no charges have been brought.

Business crime and the „fight“ against it
by Anja Lederer
The proceedings of Berlin’s public prosecution’s economic department are in large part initiated by communications from other authorities (customs, tax authority, insolvency tribunals). The number of proceedings is lower than those of other public prosecution departments, but they last longer. The accused are mainly persons from middle-class businesses. Because they are not your „usual suspects“, remand periods and prison sentences are rare.

Laws against money laundering
by Norbert Pütter
Money laundering has been illegal for over 10 years in Germany now. During this time span, the relevant laws have been „improved“ and widened several times. Instead of enabling the promised „fight“ against organised crime, the money laundering regulations have in particular led to the further loss of boundary in criminal law.

Money laundering: effort and failure of notifications on suspects
by Norbert Pütter
The growing notifications, in particular by banks, on suspicion of money laundering are assessed by the Financial Intelligence Units and stored in various data banks. They always trigger preliminary proceedings with the public prosecutions. The enormous efforts are contrasted with very few court sentences.

The Financial Action Task Force
by Norbert Pütter
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was created in 1989 by the G7 heads of state and government. The states of this international governmental organisation are represented by experts from law, financial and law enforcement agencies. Despite its lack of democratic legitimacy, it not only exerts pressure on its member states.

Legally regulated torture?
by Heiner Busch
If he did not disclose the whereabouts of the abducted Jakob von Metzler, they would inflict him with pain he had never experienced before. In 2002, on order of the chief of police, Frankfurt police officers threatened the kidnapper with torture. Since the case became known in February this year, the German public has started a discussion on the limits of the prohibition of torture and its „constitutional“ relativisation.

Also in 2003 – no demonstration against the WEF in Davos
by Viktor Györffy
After the authorities of the Swiss canton of Graubünden had regularly banned the demonstrations against the World Economic Forum in the past few years, this year’s demonstration was granted permission to go ahead. Around 1.500 members of the army and just as many police officers from all over Switzerland were deployed. The centre piece of the police conduct was a control point before Davos, where unwanted persons were supposed to be picked out. In practise, the protest was banned this year as well.

Video surveillance in Berlin
by Leon Hempel and Eric Töpfer
CCTV cameras are by now an every day occurrence in Germany’s cities. Although the police video surveillance of public places could not yet be enforced in Berlin, numerous private and semi-public cameras are filming the public space.