The Department of Justice announced this week that a Drug Enforcement Administration-led effort entitled Project Python resulted in more than 600 arrests targeting activities by the Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG). CJNG is considered one of the fastest growing transnational criminal organizations and one of the most prolific methamphetamine producers in the world.

An immigration judge in Memphis, Tennessee has issued a removal order against a German citizen and Tennessee resident based on his service in Nazi Germany in 1945. Friedrich Karl Berger served as an armed guard at a concentration camp in the Neuengamme Concentration Camp system.

A former executive director of the South Arkansas Youth Services (SAYS), an Arkansas based non-profit, was sentenced to 30 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release for unlawfully diverting more than $380,00 from the charity he operated to a state senator and the lobbying firm of a convicted lobbyist. The former executive director, Jerry Walsh, must also pay $515,631.56 in restitution.

A federal jury issued a guilty verdict against four defendants for their roles in running “pill mills” in Knoxville, Tennessee. A federal jury convicted Sylvia Hofstetter of Miami, Florida and Courtney Newman, Cynthia Clemons, and Holli Womack, all of Knoxville, Tennessee. The jury returned guilty verdicts against Hofstetter for a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) conspiracy, a drug conspiracy, money laundering, and maintaining drug-involved premises. The guilty verdicts against Newman, Clemons, and Womack were for maintaining drug-involved premises.

The Department of Justice has announced an indictment charging four individuals serving in the Chinese military with the Equifax breach that stole sensitive information from nearly 150 million Americans. The individuals hacked into the computer systems of the credit reporting agency Equifax, stealing Americans’ personal data and Equifax’s valuable trade secrets.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has secured the denaturalization of a convicted terrorist who sought to help al Qaeda destroy the Brooklyn Bridge in 2003. Iyman Faris, a native of Pakistan, was convicted in 2003 of providing material support to al Qaeda and sentenced to 20 years in prison. On Monday, a District Court judge ordered the revocation of Faris’s naturalized U.S. citizenship.

Four members of the United Blood Nation (Bloods) street gang were sentenced in Charlotte, North Carolina this week after pleading guilty to federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) conspiracy charges. Three of the individuals were sentenced to 35 years each followed by three years of supervised release and the final individual was sentenced to 15 years followed by three years of supervised release.

Darryl Gartley of Oregon pled guilty in August to two counts of sex trafficking minors. Gartley was sentenced this week to 149 months and 12 days in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release.

A federal jury found a Texas rheumatologist guilty for his role in a $325 million health care fraud scheme in which he falsely diagnosed patients with lifelong diseases and treated them with toxic medications.

When the two defendants were arrested, law enforcement seized propane gas tanks, soldering tools, car bomb instructions, jihadist literature, machetes and several knives from their residences.

Darryl Gartley of Oregon pled guilty in August to two counts of sex trafficking minors. Gartley was sentenced this week to 149 months and 12 days in federal prison, followed by a lifetime of supervised release.

U.S. law enforcement has arrested former head of the Mexican Federal Investigation Agency for taking millions in bribes from Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, a well-known leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel. Genaro García Lunas, the official arrested, previously worked to root out drug corruption from Mexican law enforcement.

Attorney General William Barr and law enforcement partners announced this week the conclusion of a national effort to halt money mule activity. According to the Department of Justice (DOJ), money mules assist fraud schemes by receiving money from victims, many of them elderly, and forwarding proceeds to foreign-based perpetrators. The two-month initiative resulted in disrupted mule networks from Hawaii to Florida and from Alaska to Maine.

A former law enforcement officer from the Westminster Police Department (WPD) has pled guilty to sexually assaulting a woman while on duty. Curtis Arganbright pled guilty in federal court in Denver, Colorado to one count of violating the civil rights of a female in his care whom he sexually assaulted.

Two Massachusetts men have been arrested and charged in a nationwide scheme to take over victims’ social media accounts and steal their cryptocurrency information. The individuals charged used a technique called “SIM swapping” to hack into the accounts and steal the information.

A Michigan plating company called Electro-Plating Services Inc. (EPS) has been sentenced in federal court to five years of probation and was ordered to pay $1,449,963.94 to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for failing to properly store hazardous waste. The company’s owner, Gary Sayers, was sentenced to one year in prison followed by three years of supervised release.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has announced the conclusion of a significant law enforcement operation in Brazil that has led to U.S. indictments for criminal human smuggling. The targeted smugglers are alleged to have smuggled individuals from South Asia and elsewhere into Brazil and ultimately to the U.S.

Chandra Yarlagadda owned and operated Alpha Bioenergy LLC (Alpha), formerly known as Naturol Bioenergy LLC, which purchased and sold biodiesel fuel. Yarlagadda has pled guilty to violating tax laws in order to avoid paying an additional $2.3 million in federal income taxes.

Jong Woo Son, a South Korean national, was indicted by a federal grand jury this week for his involvement with Welcome To Video, the largest child sexual exploitation market by volume of content. Son is the international actor among hundreds of domestic perpetrators indicted on charges relating to the website’s use.

A grand jury has convicted three leaders of the national criminal organization, Gangster Disciples. The convicted offenses include racketeering conspiracy (RICO) involving murder, attempted murder in aid of racketeering, drug trafficking conspiracy, and other crimes.