Global General

Colombia extradites financial conman to US

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-08-06 11:46

BOGOTA - Colombian authorities on Thursday extradited a financial swindler involved in a multi-billion dollar scam, to the United States, official sources said.

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Margarita Pabon, a lawyer of a company known as D.M.G., has been accused by New York's Court of the Southern District of setting up an international network of money laundering and drug trafficking.

According to the General Attorney, the company, which operated a financial "pyramid" scheme, cheated more than 200,000 investors of at least $2 billion in a period of three years.

Early on Thursday, Pabon was escorted by police from her detention site to a prison in south Bogota, then to Catam Airport, where she was to be handed over to US drug agents.

Pabon was the third person involved in the financial scam who was extradited to the United States, after David Murcia Guzman and William Suarez, all members of the organization and masterminds of the fraud.

In 2008, the Colombian government launched an investigation into the multi-billion dollar scam, labelling it the biggest financial scandal in recent years.