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- GRAPEVINE, Page 21A Worrisome Brand of Japanese Investor
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- By JANICE CASTRO
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- Even as the FBI is gaining ground on the American branch
- of the Mafia, it is getting ready to take on a new threat: the
- YAKUZA -- Japanese mobsters. An estimated 100,000 yakuza in
- Japan rake in some $10 billion a year from narcotics, extortion
- and loan-sharking. As the gangs channel that cash into
- legitimate investments in the U.S. and Europe, the FBI will be
- hard pressed to decipher the money trail. One reason: money
- laundering is not a crime in Japan, so the mobsters can operate
- through shell corporations without the kind of close scrutiny
- at home that hampers crooks in other countries -- and provides
- invaluable help to American law enforcement.
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