Bank tellers policing money-laundering laws

Centre student Vanessa Iafolla in the media spotlight.

Front-line bank employees are doing their share to ensure anti-money laundering laws are upheld, a University of Toronto doctoral student said at the University of New Brunswick's Wu Conference Centre on Monday.

Vanessa Iafolla is a doctoral candidate at the university's Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies who spoke at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences on Monday.

She said under post-9-11 Canadian anti-terrorism law - namely the Proceeds of Crime and Terrorism Financing Act - bank tellers are required to report transactions they deem suspicious to the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada. That means using their discretion as to what they believe are suspicious or unusual transactions, generally relating to bank deposits.

"What's neat about this is, that when you think about it, when an investigation happens, or when a crime happens, it's the police who do the investigating," she said. "And what you have now you have these people who are hired to do a different job - process cheques and cash - who are doing a kind of policing job."

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