Money Manager Charged With Laundering $1Bn Through Bahamas Investment Firm

by Leroy Baker, for LawAndTax-News.com, New York

25 January 2006

Law enforcement agencies in the United States have announced the arrest of the head of a Bahamas-based investment management company, who has been accused of laundering more than $1 billion in funds derived from tax evasion, drug trafficking, securities fraud and bank fraud.

Martin Tremblay, President and Manager of Dominion Investments, a Bahamas-based investment services provider and financial advisor, was arrested Monday by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force’s Strike Force.

An indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court charges Tremblay with conspiring with a number of other defendants to launder $1 billion in illegal proceeds for numerous Dominion Investments clients, all in exchange for a substantial commission, in a long-term money laundering scheme.

According to the indictment, Dominion Investments is an investment services provider and financial advisor incorporated in the Commonwealth of the Bahamas in 1994, licensed by the Securities Commission of the Bahamas, and a member of the Bahamas Financial Services Board.

Dominion Investments’ website states that the company is a “leader in the offshore financial services” market, offering its clients “the knowledge and expertise they need to effectively use international tax planning, asset protection, and other wealth preservation techniques”.

The indictment charges that from approximately 1998 through December 2005, Tremblay used Dominion Investment accounts to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in proceeds from international narcotics trafficking, securities fraud scams, income tax evasion, mail and wire fraud schemes, and bank fraud, among other crimes.

Tremblay was then said to have laundered the illicit funds by transferring them into United States bank accounts and offshore bank accounts in Canada, the Bahamas, and elsewhere around the world.

To further conceal the source and nature of these funds, Tremblay and his co-conspirators are said to have created shell companies and fictitious entities, using the same false nominees, addresses, and telephone numbers, to launder the illegal proceeds.

The indictment alleges that $50 million in proceeds from tax evasion was laundered through Dominion Investments, along with a further $3 million in the proceeds from the sale of GHB kits, more commonly known as the “date-rape drug”, and millions of dollars derived from cocaine trafficking and numerous stock fraud schemes.

Tremblay was captured as a result of an undercover sting operation conducted by the Strike Force in 2005, during which he was videotaped agreeing to launder large amounts of money earned from narcotics sales. Approximately $220,000 was eventually transferred by wire to Dominion Investments-related accounts.

If convicted on the money laundering charges, Tremblay faces a maximum sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment and a fine of twice the value of the laundered narcotics proceeds.

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