Sen. Patrick Leahy says he's pleased that the Department of Justice has recovered $24 billion in penalties from a group of financial institutions that were involved in the mortgage fraud that led to the recession in 2008.
The federal Department of Justice says Citibank and J.P. Morgan paid "record penalties" under the settlement.
But no corporate officials will be going to jail because the companies did not have to admit to any fraudulent activity as part of the agreement. Leahy says he's disappointed that this is the case:
"I would like to have more accountability,” said Leahy. “Let's not look at the glass as half empty. We have $24 billion returned to taxpayers that we did not have before. That is a good thing."
"I am a former prosecutor. I have always said that we should be sending some people to jail." - Senator Patrick Leahy on the need to pass tougher corporate fraud laws.
Leahy is co-sponsoring legislation that would make it much harder for corporate officials, in these kinds of cases, to escape jail time in the future.
"I'm a former prosecutor I've always said that we should be sending some people to jail,” said Leahy. “When we've gone after corporate fraud or corporate mis-action and people have actually gone to jail, that's when all of sudden everybody starts focusing [on], 'Wait a minute we better clean up our act.' We saw this in the Bernie Madoff case."
Leahy says his plan enjoys bi-partisan support and he's hopeful that it will be considered by the Senate Judiciary committee when the new Congressional session starts in January.
