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Prosecutors snagged their first guilty plea in the Enron energy scandal last week. Former executive Michael Kopper admitted conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. He has promised to forfeit $12 million in illegal profits, which will be distributed to Enron victims. Now, if only taxpayers could get some of their money back from a far bigger corporate energy fraud that continues unabated in Washington: Ethanol. The corn-based fuel is backed by both Democrats and Republicans, who are hungry for contributions from agricultural conglomerate Archer Daniels Midland (which owns 41% of U.S. ethanol production capacity) and desperate for votes...

Prosecutors snagged their first guilty plea in the Enron energy scandal last week. Former executive Michael Kopper admitted to money laundering and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. He has promised to forfeit $12 million in illegal profits, which will be distributed to Enron victims. Now, if only taxpayers could get some of their money back from a far bigger corporate energy fraud that continues unabated in Washington: Ethanol. The corn-based fuel is backed by both Democrats and Republicans, who are hungry for contributions from agricultural conglomerate Archer Daniels Midland (which owns 41 percent of U.S. ethanol production capacity) and...

The AGRIBUSINESS EXAMINER June 21, 2002 #170 Monitoring Corporate Agribusiness From a Public Interest Perspective EDITOR\PUBLISHER: A.V. Krebs ADDRESS: PO. Box 2201, Everett, Washington 98203-0201 E-MAIL: avkrebs@earthlink.net WEB SITE: http://www.ea1.com/CARP/ TO RECEIVE: Name and e-mail address CONTRIBUTIONS WELCOME !!! U.S. APPEALS COURT REINSTATES LAWSUIT ALLEGING ADM AND OTHERS ENGAGED IN CORN SWEETNER PRICE FIXING SCOTT KILMAN, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: The Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated a seven-year-old civil lawsuit alleging Archer Daniels Midland Co. and its rivals rigged what is now a $2.4 billion market for a corn sweetener used in everything from soft drinks to candy....

Cuba has now more products to sell. Thanks to Archer Daniel Midland HAVANA (AP) - Touring a Cuban plant where soybeans are transformed into yogurt, the head of American agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland said Wednesday his company now makes regular deliveries of U.S. food to this communist country, forming a strong base for long-term trade. ``Our ships are coming to Cuba from America on a regular basis,'' said G. Allen Andreas, ADM chairman and chief executive. He said that as he spoke, his company's cargo ships were unloading food at ports in Havana, the central city of Cienfuegos and...

INTERVIEW WITH HECTOR CRUZ, CHEMICAL ENGINEER FIRED FROM ARCHER DANIELS MIDLAND MARTINSBURG, WEST VIRGINIA Hector Cruz is a chemical engineer who worked for four years at Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) in Decatur, Illinois. He was fired from the facility in 1998 after he reported to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) excessive releases of hexane into the atmosphere. He moved on to get another job in West Virginia with another multinational corporation. Earlier this year, Becky Ellis, a mom who lives in suburban Decatur, called Cruz. Ellis is investigating the causes of the death of her 22-year old son, Dan Ellis....

U.S. Attorney Joshua Hochberg Unfit For Office By: David Hoech - March 26, 2002 U.S. Attorney Hochberg has been chief of the Fraud Section of the DOJ’s Criminal Division since 1998. From 1995 to 1998 Hochberg served as deputy chief for litigation in the Public Integrity Section (PIS). Presently he also serves as acting U.S. Attorney for the southern district of Texas. On June 27, 1995 the FBI raided the headquarters of Archer Daniels Midland Company in Decatur, Illinois. For more than two years prior to the raid ADM executive Mark Whitacre worked with the FBI to audio and video...