Forum Post: Citigroup's SEC Violations - and CA's Attorney General.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/09/opinion/letting-the-banks-off-easy.html

"In September, the attorney general of California, Kamala Harris, withdrew from settlement talks between the banks and federal and state officials over mortgage abuses. Ms. Harris said California was being asked to excuse bank conduct that has not been adequately investigated and to grant the banks an unacceptably broad release from legal liability for the mortgage mess.

Those grave reservations have also been raised by other state attorneys general - including Eric Schneiderman of New York and Joseph Beau Biden III of Delaware. The administration, however, wants a deal. As pressure builds to get on board, Ms. Harris and her like-minded peers should stand their ground and avoid letting the banks off easy."

Dear Occupy: Maybe you want to tell Kamala Harris that you support her, and that you want her to investigate and prosecute? Or maybe you want to leave her out to dry for standing up to the banks.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-scheer/california-refuses-to-acc_b_1085581.html

"As the Times reported when Citigroup agreed to settle SEC charges last month: 'Citigroup's main brokerage subsidiary, its predecessors or its parent company agreed to not violate the very same antifraud statue in July 2010. And in May 2006. Also as far back as March 2005 and April 2000.'

Not that the bankers face prison time, since the Justice Department has refused to act in these cases, and the Securities and Exchange Commission is bringing only civil charges, which the banks find quite tolerable.

...

The fix was in for what a New York Times editorial on Tuesday headlined 'Letting the Banks Off Easy' described as 'paltry' mortgage relief, reducing by less than $20 billion the balances of 14.5 million underwater homeowners who are 'drowning in some $700 billion of negative equity.' The deal has been stalled by the refusal of California Attorney General Kamala Harris to accept this sellout. Among its other disastrous concessions would be ending further investigation by the states into financial skullduggery connected with the housing meltdown.

In September, Harris, elected in a Democratic sweep of the state's top offices in 2010, went against the dictates of the Democrat in the White House, stating that she refused to release the banks from legal liability for the mortgage crisis. That is the nub of the pending White House-brokered deal with the banks."