تأثیر قانون مبارزه با پول‌شویی بر کشف جرم منشأ و پیشگیری از فعالیت‌های اقتصادی مجرمانه در ایران

This study aims to analyze the impact of the implementation of the anti-money laundering law on the detection of the origin crime and the prevention of economic crimes. The statistical population was determined by tax, banking, and justice experts, among whom 54 people were selected in a targeted way. Data was collected using a researcher-made questionnaire and its reliability and validity were confirmed. The research hypotheses were tested using the structural equation modeling approach. The results show that the implementation of the anti-money laundering law by the banking and tax systems did not have a significant effect on the detection of the origin crime and the prevention of economic crimes. Also, the impact of the independent variable directly and through the mediator variable is not significant, and the model lacks predictive power. It seems that the reasons for the failure of the implementation of the anti-money laundering law are the existence of jurisprudential and legal contradictions in the existing law, precedence of proving the origin of crime before proving the crime of money laundering, the lack of coordination of institutions, technical problems in the tax and banking system, and the lack of cooperation with the judicial system.

Introduction

In Iran's Islamic Punishment Law (I.P.L) economic crime is mentioned with its cases and avoided its general definition, but if only these cases are considered as economic crimes, their volume and number are very large and increasing. Money laundering is known as an economic crime and regarding it, the Anti-Money Laundering Law (A. M. L. L) has been put on the agenda of the Central Bank of Iran. Money laundering is a crime that originated from other economic crimes. Since all economic crimes are financial and their results will be seen in people's bank accounts, or the transfer of assets, a tax organization is on the path of these transfers, it seems that A.M.L.L through these two institutions, can affect the reduction of economic crimes.
In today's world, to eliminate or slow down the speed of economic criminal activities, various governmental, public and sometimes private institutions have joined hands with the help of technological advances to protect the property of the people and the government, as well as obtaining the legal share of the government from the economic activities and at the same time to prevent economic crimes, they have provided effective and practical solutions and in addition to implementing them, they have been successful in preventing these crimes. One of these solutions is A. M. L. L and its operationalization in the banking and tax systems of such countries.
One of the ways to discover the crime is the quality of A. M. L. L and its systematic implementation. Through money laundering, the proceeds of criminal activities enter the economic system, and related organizations must prevent this process. Meanwhile, the judiciary, the banking system, and the tax organization play the main role in monitoring income and money.

A) How the implementation of A. M. L. L. affects the prevention and spread of economic crime.
b) How the implementation of A. Does M. L. L. affect the discovery of crimes?
c) Is it possible to discover the origin of crime through the implementation of the A. M. L. L and does it affect the prevention and spread of economic crime in Iran?

 

Methodology

The current research method is a descriptive, qualitative, and applied survey. The statistical population includes judicial experts including judges of criminal branches and lawyers, banking, and tax experts. Also, the structural equation modeling approach was used to test the research hypotheses.
 

Results and Discussion

Implementation of A. M. L. L. through the tax and banking system, has not had any effect on the prevention of economic crimes, either directly or through the discovery of the origin crime (intermediary). Also, the influence coefficient (f²) shows that the independent variables do not directly affect the dependent variable. The Sobel coefficient also shows that the influence of the independent variable on the dependent variable through the intermediary variable is not significant. The size of the Stone-Jesser statistic (Q²) in both models shows that, considering that, the implementation of A. M. L. L. through the banking and tax system, does not affect discovering the origin of crime and prevention of economic crimes, it does not have the power of prediction. To evaluate the goodness of fit of the aforementioned model, the value of the SRMR index and NFI index are equal to 0.14 and 0.39, respectively, which the first model lacks and the second has a goodness of fit and predictability.
 

Conclusions

Based on what was mentioned in the theoretical foundations and previous studies, it was predicted that the implementation of A. M. L. L., cause to discover the origin of crime and therefore prevent the commission and spread of economic crimes. But, not only these crimes have not decreased, their number and even their severity are increasing every day. The research results showed that the implementation of A. M. L. L. has not had a significant impact on the prevention of criminal economic activities. Some empirical studies that have reached a similar conclusion have referred to this issue as the contradiction between jurisprudence and the law in this matter, which means that the bank and the tax administration do not have the right to interfere in people's financial affairs based on the principle of innocence and they cannot ask the customers and taxpayers "Where did you get it (money) from?", and customers can open a bank account and make savings and withdrawals without restrictions.
Some researchers believe that if the banking system takes the approach of absolute independence of the origin crime from money laundering, and if the bank system has the right to ask, "Where did you get it from?" the customer, money laundering will be identifiable. It seems that subjecting money laundering to the primary or origin crime and considering it as a secondary crime has caused this lack of success in the implementation of the A. M. L. L.
In other words, the crime of money laundering cannot be proven until the origin crime is proven, so contrary to the prediction of the researcher and the mentioned theory, by identifying the origin crime, the crime of money laundering is identified, as the result of the hypotheses test showed, the implementation of the law by the banking system in this regard has not been successful.
Considering the answers to the questions in the questionnaire shows that the banking and tax systems have not cooperated to help discover the origin of crime or prevent economic crimes, and they are facing legal obstacles (Abdolahi, 2019). It seems that one of the reasons for the failure of A. M. L. L. is the presence of heavy punishments with uncertainty and broken implementation, which was pointed out by Gharamani and Saibani (2017).
 

Selection of References

Abdollahi, Hosein. (2021). Tax Assessment Based on Banking Transactions in the Iranian Legal System. Journal of Tax Research, 28(48), 61-82.  doi:10.52547/taxjournal.28.48.61. Persian
Abolhasani Hastiani, Asghar, & Daniali, Ghorban. (2018). Developing a Strategic Model for Money Laundering Prevention in the Banking System of Iran. (Case study: Bank Saderat Iran). Quarterly Journal of Public Organizations Management, 6(4), 11-24. Persian
doi:10.30473/ipom.2018.5030
Ahmadi Jouibary, Mehdi. (2016). The crime of money laundering and the explanation of its prevalence and spread in societies. Studies of Political Science, Law, and Jurisprudence, 2(2), 57 - 68. Persian
Ali, Mahrus and et all. (2021). Corruption, asset origin and the criminal case of money laundering in Indonesian law. Journal of Money Laundering Control. Persian
Aluko, Ayodeji, & Bagheri, Mahmood. (2012). The impact of money laundering on economic and financial stability and political development in developing countries. Journal of Money Laundering Control, 15(4), 442-457. doi:10.1108/13685201211266024