Banking and Finance Law Daily Wrap Up, CRIMES AND OFFENSES—Holder’s remarks that no bank is “too-big-to-indict” doubted, (Jan 27, 2014)

By J. Preston Carter, J.D., LL.M.

Responding to remarks by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in an MSNBC interview that no bank is "too big to indict" and that the Justice Department has more cases coming involving "significant financial institutions" as it continues to investigate Wall Street misconduct, Dennis Kelleher, President and CEO of Better Markets, Inc., said that it is “hard not to be skeptical after five years of inexcusable failure to bring a single criminal action against the wealthy, powerful and politically well-connected too-big-to-fail Wall Street banks.”

According to Kelleher, Holder’s statement “is contradicted by the Department of Justice’s recent failure to indict JP Morgan Chase or any of its subsidiaries, executives, officers or other staff for numerous illegal and criminal actions.” Kelleher argued that Holder’s statement that the Justice Department has brought charges against “thousands of people,” while true, is “misleading because those charges were mostly against the small time individuals and firms.” Although Kelleher agreed that those people “should have been prosecuted,” he said, “that’s not prosecuting the too-big-to-fail banks on Wall Street and their executives.”

Kelleher accused the Justice Department of creating a “double standard of justice” where the “too-big-to-fail Wall Street banks use shareholders’ money to buy their way out of criminal prosecution, but they throw the book at everyone else.”

Kelleher had earlier posed a number of questions that he said remained unanswered following the Justice Department’s settlement with JPMorgan Chase (see Banking and Finance Daily Update, Dec. 2, 2013).

Better Markets, Inc., is an independent nonprofit organization that promotes the public interest in the financial markets.

Companies: Better Markets, Inc.; JPMorgan Chase

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