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WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Customs Service today announced that the U.S. government has presented a check for $843,388.13 to the government of Mexico as a result of forfeiture proceedings stemming from a collaborative money laundering investigation into Mexico's former Deputy Attorney General, Mario Ruiz Massieu.

In a ceremony today at the headquarters of the Agencia Federal de Investigaciones (AFI) in Mexico City, the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, Antonio O. Garza, Jr., provided the forfeiture check to Rafael Macedo de la Concha, the Attorney General of Mexico. Agents from the U.S. Customs Service Attaché office in Mexico City were on hand for the presentation.

The collaborative investigation began in 1995, when the Mexican Attorney General's Office requested help from U.S. authorities in locating Massieu, who had just fled Mexico. On March 3, 1995, U.S. Customs agents arrested Massieu in Newark as he boarded a flight to Spain. Massieu was arrested for failing to report the full $46,000 in currency he was taking abroad. Although the charge was later dismissed, Massieu remained under house arrest.

Subsequent investigation by U.S. Customs agents in Houston and Newark revealed that Massieu had accumulated roughly $9 million in an account at Texas Commerce Bank in Houston between 1993 and 1995. At the time, Massieu was a Mexican Deputy Attorney General and responsible for overseeing anti-drug investigations. Customs agents seized the account. In March 1997, a federal jury found that the funds in the account were drug proceeds. A U.S. District Judge then ordered the seized $9,041,598.68 forfeited to the U.S. government

In August 1999, a federal grand jury in Houston issued a 25-count criminal indictment charging Massieu with money laundering and conspiracy violations. Customs agents arrested Massieu at his home in Palisades Park, NJ. In September 1999, a few days before he was to appear in court for his arraignment, Massieu committed suicide at his home.

The payment of $843,388 to the government of Mexico is possible through asset sharing program of the Treasury Department's Asset Forfeiture Fund. Under this program, a percentage of assets forfeited to the U.S. in an investigation can be shared with domestic and/or foreign law enforcement agencies that participated in the underlying investigation.

The investigation into Massieu was a joint effort by the Mexican Attorney General's Office, the U.S. Customs Service, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas, the Justice Department's Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service.