US Justice Department’s Corporate Fraud Task Force welcomes new member, Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve becomes one of six agencies to join the force.
The central bank joined the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Office of Thrift Supervision, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Special Inspector General for the Trouble Asset Relief Program (TARP) in the biggest expansion of the group since its formation in July 2002.
In a statement, the Justice Department said the new members had been added to aid its crackdown on mortgage and securitization fraud. According to deputy attorney general Mark R Filip, the task force’s chairman, inter-agency collaboration it creates is “invaluable” in tackling corporate-level mortgage fraud.
“These new members reflect the breadth and depth of the mortgage crisis that we are now confronting, and the urgency of the task before us,” says Mark R Filip.
Other members of the task force include seven US attorneys’ offices, the director of the FBI and the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
L.D.