Forum Think Finance - Bolsa e Forex
Geral => Política e Economia Política => Tópico iniciado por: Thunder em 2016-01-04 17:26:56
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O tópico servirá para ir partilhando notícias sobre situações de conflito claro de interesses, "revolving doors", corrupção comprovada em tribunal, investigações, etc.
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A crise de 2007 por si só terá inúmeros casos para serem explorados. Deixo aqui uma das situações:
Eric Holder, iniciou o seu cargo de chefe da divisão criminal do Dep. de Justiça em Fevereiro de 2009.
Antes dessa data (com início em 2001), trabalhou numa firma de advocacia chamada Covington & Burling.
A pessoa em causa tem importância por estas razões:
(bolds e sublinhados da minha autoria)
Reuters reported in December that under Holder and Breuer, the Justice Department hasn't brought any criminal cases against big banks or other companies involved in mortgage servicing, even though copious evidence has surfaced of apparent criminal violations in foreclosure cases.
The evidence, including records from federal and state courts and local clerks' offices around the country, shows widespread forgery, perjury, obstruction of justice, and illegal foreclosures on the homes of thousands of active-duty military personnel.
In recent weeks the Justice Department has come under renewed pressure from members of Congress, state and local officials and homeowners' lawyers to open a wide-ranging criminal investigation of mortgage servicers, the biggest of which have been Covington clients. So far Justice officials haven't responded publicly to any of the requests.
While Holder and Breuer were partners at Covington, the firm's clients included the four largest U.S. banks - Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo & Co - as well as at least one other bank that is among the 10 largest mortgage servicers.
Servicers perform routine mortgage maintenance tasks, including filing foreclosures, on behalf of mortgage owners, usually groups of investors who bought mortgage-backed securities.
Covington represented Freddie Mac, one of the nation's biggest issuers of mortgage backed securities, in enforcement investigations by federal financial regulators.
A particular concern by those pressing for an investigation is Covington's involvement with Virginia-based MERS Corp, which runs a vast computerized registry of mortgages. Little known before the mortgage crisis hit, MERS, which stands for Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, has been at the center of complaints about false or erroneous mortgage documents.
Court records show that Covington, in the late 1990s, provided legal opinion letters needed to create MERS on behalf of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase and several other large banks. It was meant to speed up registration and transfers of mortgages. By 2010, MERS claimed to own about half of all mortgages in the U.S. -- roughly 60 million loans.
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Several lawyers for homeowners have said that even if Holder and Breuer haven't violated any ethics rules, their ties to Covington create an impression of bias toward the firms' clients, especially in the absence of any prosecutions by the Justice Department.
fonte (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-holder-mortgage-idUSTRE80J0PH20120120)
Just months after stepping down from the Justice Department, former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is rejoining Covington & Burling, a Washington, D.C.-based white shoe law firm, where he worked from 2001 to 2009 before joining the Barack Obama administration. At least five other lawyers, who worked at the Justice Department under Holder, including former enforcement chief Lanny Breuer, have also landed at the firm.
Holder’s return to Covington is emblematic of the revolving door between government and the reins of corporate power that undermines public trust and erodes the integrity of the financial industry. His tenure as the nation’s top prosecutor was marked by withering criticism of failure to prosecute the banks represented by Covington, including Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citigroup. Despite the catastrophic affect of the 2008 financial crisis, not a single bank executive has been prosecuted. Holder instead relied on deferred and non-prosecution agreements, and extrajudicial settlements — back room deals that escaped judicial review. Many did not require an admission of guilt. He also allowed banks to classify fines, which represented a fraction of their earnings, as “remedial payments,” making them tax deductible
fonte (http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/7/close-the-revolving-door-between-washington-and-wall-street.html)
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O mais estranho é o Sr. Holder, ter sido nomeado para um cargo tão fundamental, após ter participado como advogado de defesa no caso em que a companhia de frutas Chiquita, financiou um grupo classificado como terrorista na Colômbia.
The issue of direct payments to the justice department by offending US corporations is a worrying trend. It is one that has risen sharply under the Bush administration and was first championed by former attorney general John Ashcroft. In lieu of a trial, companies are allowed to pay a fine directly to the justice department. These agreements are readily accepted by companies, as they are cost effective, avoid the stigma of public trial and don't set precedents. None of the money paid goes to affected individuals or communities, which leaves any sense of justice wanting. There is also valid concern that abuse of this system may lead to companies being less scrupulous.
Representing Chiquita, Holder brokered a deal for the banana giant to pay $25m over five years to the justice department. This arrangement was made after Chiquita admitted in 2003 to providing $1.7m over six years to the paramilitary group The United Self Defense Forces of Colombia. This group was listed as a terrorist organisation by the state department. Chiquita also allegedly provided a cache of surplus Nicaraguan army AK-47s through their own transport network. The payments continued unabated for months after Chiquita's admission.
The company claimed the payments were made to protect its workers, but it is unclear who was protected. Colombia's attorney general, Mario Iguaran, roundly rejects Chiquita's excuses. Iguaran believes the payments were made to secure the unimpeded production of bananas and to quell labour unrest. He claims that at least 4,000 people were killed by these paramilitaries. Hundreds of the victims were banana workers and labour organisers.
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In the final presidential debate, Obama stated that he firmly opposed a free trade agreement with Colombia. He was concerned about the multitude of human rights violations repeatedly levied against unions and other workers there. Holder's views fly in the face of such concerns.
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Every client is entitled to representation. Holder's roll as council to Chiquita is not questionable. The question is more fundamental: Does Holder represent the change we need and the change we were promised? It is time that someone who chooses to represent and serve human beings over corporations holds the position of attorney general.
fonte (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2008/nov/25/attornery-general-eric-holder-chiquita)
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Concurso com perfil à medida:
Hospitais manipularam concursos para favorecer sociedade de advogados
08 Janeiro 2016, 09:24 por Negócios | jng@negocios.pt
Concurso exigia que o coordenador da sociedade a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde. Este e outros critérios foram considerados ilegais, segundo avança o Jornal de Notícias.
O Centro Hospitalar de Lisboa Central (CHLC), que integra os principais hospitais da capital, foi recentemente condenado por ter manipulado um concurso público para a contratação de uma sociedade de advogados que, entre outros serviços jurídicos, se responsabilizaria pela cobrança de dívidas. O Tribunal Administrativo do Círculo de Lisboa considerou que os requisitos viciaram o concurso para favorecer uma sociedade de advogados, a BAS, avança esta sexta-feira, 8 de Janeiro, o Jornal de Notícias.
Os actos do concurso para um contrato que duraria 24 meses, com um valor total de mais de 189 mil euros, foram declarados nulos.
"O que é facto é que os requisitos técnicos são tão exigentes, que quase parecem identificar algum candidato concreto que pretendem seleccionar, aparentando o que o senso comum designa de 'fato à medida', o que ressalta a 'olhos vistos'", refere a juíza na sentença.
O tribunal considerou ilegal que o concurso exigisse que os candidatos já prestassem serviços jurídicos a três entidades sob a tutela do ministério da Saúde e que o coordenador da sociedade de advogados a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde.
A BAS já presta há cinco anos serviços jurídicos ao CHLC, que integra os hospitais de São José, Santa Marta, Santo António dos Capuchos, Dona Estefância, Curry Cabral e a Maternidade Alfredo da Costa.
Em declarações ao Jornal de Notícias, o Centro Hospital refere que não vai recorrer da decisão para não ficar "sem assessoria jurídica no imediato" e que reiniciará o concurso.
"Se efectivamente houvesse um prestador a quem se quisesse adjudicar o concurso, ter-se-ia recorrido a um procedimento de ajuste directo", "e não a um concurso", refere a instituição.
A acção judicial foi apresentada por uma das sociedades de advogados que se queria candidatar mas não cumpria os requisitos, a de Nuno Cerejeira Namora. Luís Nobre Guedes também avançou com um processo.
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Concurso com perfil à medida:
Hospitais manipularam concursos para favorecer sociedade de advogados
08 Janeiro 2016, 09:24 por Negócios | jng@negocios.pt
Concurso exigia que o coordenador da sociedade a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde. Este e outros critérios foram considerados ilegais, segundo avança o Jornal de Notícias.
O Centro Hospitalar de Lisboa Central (CHLC), que integra os principais hospitais da capital, foi recentemente condenado por ter manipulado um concurso público para a contratação de uma sociedade de advogados que, entre outros serviços jurídicos, se responsabilizaria pela cobrança de dívidas. O Tribunal Administrativo do Círculo de Lisboa considerou que os requisitos viciaram o concurso para favorecer uma sociedade de advogados, a BAS, avança esta sexta-feira, 8 de Janeiro, o Jornal de Notícias.
Os actos do concurso para um contrato que duraria 24 meses, com um valor total de mais de 189 mil euros, foram declarados nulos.
não sei os valores exactos, mas creio que por 189 mil euros podiam mesmo fazer ajuste directo sem problema. Já vi fazerem por mais que isso.
O tribunal considerou ilegal que o concurso exigisse que os candidatos já prestassem serviços jurídicos a três entidades sob a tutela do ministério da Saúde e que o coordenador da sociedade de advogados a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde.
O 1º requisito é esquisito...mas o 2º nem por isso...eu também queria que eles percebessem de direito da saúde se eu fosse o hospital.
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o bloco central esta todo queimado com ajustes diretos
o outro bloco esquerda podia dar cabo disto, em vez andar dar cabo dos piropos
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O BE e todos os outros, andam sempre caladinhos em relação aos ajustes directos, pois as bases das máquinas partidárias alimentam-se muito explorando a rubrica de "aquisição de bens e serviços".
Ainda em Novembro foram injectados mais de 500 M Euros para a aquisição de bens e serviços. Ao invés da despesa estar a contrair como o previsto em OE, estava a aumentar mais de 3%.
Foi uma falha enorme da gestão do PPC, não atacar esta área.
Quando só para suplementar o orçamento são precisos mais de 500 M euros, dá para ter a noção da escala de números em causa.
Mas um tema desta importância não é falado. Comunicação social, políticos, analistas.
Não consigo arranjar nenhuma explicação plausível.
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Concurso com perfil à medida:
Hospitais manipularam concursos para favorecer sociedade de advogados
08 Janeiro 2016, 09:24 por Negócios | jng@negocios.pt
Concurso exigia que o coordenador da sociedade a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde. Este e outros critérios foram considerados ilegais, segundo avança o Jornal de Notícias.
O Centro Hospitalar de Lisboa Central (CHLC), que integra os principais hospitais da capital, foi recentemente condenado por ter manipulado um concurso público para a contratação de uma sociedade de advogados que, entre outros serviços jurídicos, se responsabilizaria pela cobrança de dívidas. O Tribunal Administrativo do Círculo de Lisboa considerou que os requisitos viciaram o concurso para favorecer uma sociedade de advogados, a BAS, avança esta sexta-feira, 8 de Janeiro, o Jornal de Notícias.
Os actos do concurso para um contrato que duraria 24 meses, com um valor total de mais de 189 mil euros, foram declarados nulos.
não sei os valores exactos, mas creio que por 189 mil euros podiam mesmo fazer ajuste directo sem problema. Já vi fazerem por mais que isso.
O tribunal considerou ilegal que o concurso exigisse que os candidatos já prestassem serviços jurídicos a três entidades sob a tutela do ministério da Saúde e que o coordenador da sociedade de advogados a ser escolhida tivesse o grau de doutor na especialidade de direito da saúde.
O 1º requisito é esquisito...mas o 2º nem por isso...eu também queria que eles percebessem de direito da saúde se eu fosse o hospital.
Doutoramento em direito da saúde! Isso nem um tipo de doutoramento é. Se calhar só existe um jurista em Portugal com esse tipo de doutoramento (e eles sabiam que existia, senão não pediam). E a tese até pode ser sobre algo diferente do que o hospital quer (por exemplo, tese em má prática clínica e trabalho em contratação pública). E quem tem esse doutoramento específico até pode ter pouca experiência prática na área. Como poderiam estimular a concorrência de modo a baixar o preço num concurso desses?
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Doutoramento em direito da saúde! Isso nem um tipo de doutoramento é. Se calhar só existe um jurista em Portugal com esse tipo de doutoramento (e eles sabiam que existia, senão não pediam). E a tese até pode ser sobre algo diferente do que o hospital quer (por exemplo, tese em má prática clínica e trabalho em contratação pública). E quem tem esse doutoramento específico até pode ter pouca experiência prática na área. Como poderiam estimular a concorrência de modo a baixar o preço num concurso desses?
estimular a concorrência acho muito bem. mas se eu fosse um hospital privado e precisasse de assessoria jurídica podes crer que ia pedir algum tipo de formação suplementar na área da saúde (do ponto vista de direito). E se eles já tivessem experiência ou trabalhassem de momento já para outros hospitais melhor ainda.
agora se era preciso o doutoramento? épa não faço ideia....provável que não.
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$153 million in Bill and Hillary Clinton speaking fees (http://edition.cnn.com/2016/02/05/politics/hillary-clinton-bill-clinton-paid-speeches/)
Hillary Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, combined to earn more than $153 million in paid speeches from 2001 until Hillary Clinton launched her presidential campaign last spring, a CNN analysis shows.
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with Hillary Clinton, the Democratic 2016 front-runner, collecting at least $1.8 million for at least eight speeches to big banks.
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250 mil, 500 mil USD por uma palestra ou discurso. Isto (sistemas governativos/política) está totalmente podre e com um grau de descaramento inacreditável.
Estes 153 milhões não incluem as doações para a fundação Clinton.
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As palestras por vezes são usadas para pagar favores de forma legal, aparentemente. Isso acontece em muitas indústrias, por exemplo o escândalo da INSY inclui palestras pagas como forma de subornar médicos.
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As palestras por vezes são usadas para pagar favores de forma legal, aparentemente. Isso acontece em muitas indústrias, por exemplo o escândalo da INSY inclui palestras pagas como forma de subornar médicos.
Eu não diria subornar, diria que é uma política comercial.
A transparência, ou seja a prestação de serviços, deveria estar incluída num disclaimer por parte
dos intervenientes.
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No caso da INSY eram pagos regiamente, era mesmo uma forma de pagar para passarem receitas e não para informar ninguém.
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No caso da INSY eram pagos regiamente, era mesmo uma forma de pagar para passarem receitas e não para informar ninguém.
Como existe em todos os países.
Seria mais fácil, os médicos assumirem as suas opções terapêuticas com o tal disclaimer.
Sem estudo estatísticos é difícil fazer gestão na saúde, se existissem custos médios,
por grupos etários, que incluam morbilidade, seria mais fácil impor limites às prescrições
duvidosas.
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Atenção que eu estou a falar de algo diferente de a farmacêutica pagar para os médicos IREM a palestras (algo comum).
Eu estou a falar da farmacêutica pagar para os médicos supostamente DAREM as palestras (e portanto, pagar muito, tipo a Hillary -- daí a comparação -- que também as dava, não as frequentava).
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Atenção que eu estou a falar de algo diferente de a farmacêutica pagar para os médicos IREM a palestras (algo comum).
Eu estou a falar da farmacêutica pagar para os médicos supostamente DAREM as palestras (e portanto, pagar muito, tipo a Hillary -- daí a comparação -- que também as dava, não as frequentava).
Eu entendi à primeira.
O que digo é que pode existir colaboração às claras, sem criar suspeitas por causa de subterfúgios
pouco claros.
Conheci um chefe de serviço que equipou , com maquinaria cara, uma ala de cima a baixo
à pala de palestras , não foi para ele , foi para o serviço, dado que o estado dizia sempre
que não havia dinheiro ... também existe muita carolice ... e mais ele obrigava que vinha para o serviço
a fazer o mesmo... :)
Se as regras forem mais claras, existe menos margem de manobra para compadrios ....
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Curiosamente, o facto de por um médico a fazer palestras (palestras verdadeiras, pagas a preço justo) vai fazer que o médico que as faz prescreva mais vezes o produto. Fica familiarizado com ele, conhece as vantagens... entre esse e outro medicamento parecido adivinhem qual escolhe.
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As palestras por vezes são usadas para pagar favores de forma legal, aparentemente. Isso acontece em muitas indústrias, por exemplo o escândalo da INSY inclui palestras pagas como forma de subornar médicos.
Há casos em que só acredita que as intenções são boas e puras quem for muito naif.
Outro que está metido no mesmo tipo de situação é o Lula, com apresentações na casa dos 200 000 USD ... ouuuch!
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http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/college-cheating-iowa/ (http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/college-cheating-iowa/)
Deception 101
How an industry helps Chinese students cheat their way into and through U.S. colleges
By Koh Gui Qing, Alexandra Harney, Steve Stecklow and James Pomfret
Filed May 25, 2016, 6:30 p.m. GMT
Part Three: The University of Iowa suspects at least 30 Chinese students of having used ringers to take their exams. The case offers a look inside a thriving underground economy of cheating services aimed at the hundreds of thousands of Chinese kids applying to and attending foreign colleges.
IOWA CITY, Iowa – The advertisements were tailored for Chinese college students far from home, struggling with the English language and an unfamiliar culture.
Coaching services peppered the students with emails and chat messages in Chinese, offering to help foreign students at U.S. colleges do much of the work necessary for a university degree. The companies would author essays for clients. Handle their homework. Even take their exams. All for about a $1,000 a course.
For dozens of Chinese nationals at the University of Iowa, the offers proved irresistible.
“Test-taking services. Paper-writing. Take Online Courses for you,” says the social-messaging profile of one Chinese coaching outfit used by Iowa students, UI International Student Services. A pitch emailed by another business ended with this reassuring claim: “Your friends are all using us.”
Today, the University of Iowa, one of the largest state universities in the American Midwest, says it is investigating at least 30 students suspected of cheating. Three sources familiar with the inquiry say the number under investigation may be two or three times higher.
University spokespeople declined to name the students or comment on their nationality, citing academic privacy laws.
But those familiar with the investigation said that most, perhaps all, of the cheating suspects are Chinese nationals. They stand accused of cheating in online versions of at least three courses, including law and economics. Three of the Chinese suspects admitted to Reuters that they hired Chinese-run outfits to take exams for them.
Related content
Part One: College Board gave “compromised” SATs
Part Two: How the new SAT got hacked
Podcast: How foreign students game the SAT
• U.S. students given SATs that were online before exam
A May 8 letter sent by the university to a fourth Chinese student, who allegedly had imposters take his midterms for him, says the school will recommend expulsion. “We are unable to be sure that you will not cheat in the future, since your past actions call your future behavior into question,” it reads. Foreigners in the United States on student visas face possible deportation under U.S. immigration law if expelled from school.
The Iowa cheating rings are the latest evidence of how a vibrant East Asian industry is corrupting the U.S. higher education system by gaming entrance exams, concocting college applications and completing college coursework on behalf of students. These nimble operators not only help students cheat their way into universities. They also help them cheat their way through.
The companies are prospering by exploiting two intersecting interests: the growing demand by Chinese nationals to study overseas, and the desire by U.S. colleges to profit from foreign students willing to pay full tuition.
As Reuters reported in March, some companies are leveraging weaknesses in the SAT, a standardized college entrance exam, to help clients gain an unfair advantage on the test by feeding them questions in advance.
In addition, Reuters has identified companies in China that help students contrive their entire college application – embellishing or ghostwriting application essays, doctoring letters of recommendation from high school teachers, and even advising kids to obtain fake high school transcripts. Other providers continue the illicit assistance after admission, such as those that performed coursework for hire in Iowa City.
“The reality is for international students, particularly in Asia, there’s a worry about whether the application is authentic, whether the essay is authentic, whether the person who shows up at your door is the same person who applied,” said Joyce E. Smith, chief executive of the National Association for College Admission Counseling in Arlington, Virginia.
“There’s a worry about whether the application is authentic, whether the essay is authentic, whether the person who shows up at your door is the same person who applied.”
Joyce E. Smith, chief executive of the National Association for College Admission Counseling
The cheating services extend far beyond Iowa. At the University of Washington, the University of Alabama and Penn State University, for example, students received Chinese-language advertisements by email this semester from unnamed firms. The pitch: Students could raise their grade point averages and graduate early if they hired the outfits to take classes and do assignments for them. The ads, reviewed by Reuters, offered a money-back guarantee. Students who didn’t get As would get refunds.
“APPLICATION FRAUD”
The market for such services has major potential. About 761,000 degree-seeking foreign students now study in the United States, according to the Institute of International Education. A third come from China. Department of Commerce statistics show that Chinese students spent almost $10 billion on tuition and other goods and services in America in 2014.
Of course, not all Chinese students are dishonest, and American students aren’t immune to the lure of cheating. Still, the temptation to break the rules is great in China because the stakes are extraordinarily high.
Most seats at universities in China are awarded through a competitive national entrance exam known as the gaokao, a test that requires years of round-the-clock preparation. A growing number of Chinese parents are reluctant to put their children through that gauntlet. U.S. universities offer an easier way to get ahead, with a quality education and better job prospects.
To help those students succeed, a multi-faceted industry is taking advantage of vulnerabilities in the U.S. higher education system. For colleges, vetting the applicants who use these services can be daunting. The case of Xuan “Claren” Rong shows why.
A native of Shenzhen, a city of about 11 million people on the Chinese mainland near Hong Kong, Rong spent part of high school in America. He entered the MacDuffie School, a boarding and day school in Granby, Massachusetts, as a ninth-grader in September 2011.
“He seemed to be a diligent, hard-working kid,” said Steven Griffin, MacDuffie’s head of school. Trouble was, “he was in the middle of the pack in terms of his grades,” Griffin recalled. “Apparently that was not good enough for his family.”
Reuters reviewed Rong’s transcript at MacDuffie, which the school verified as authentic. It shows his overall grade point average as of April 2014 was 2.8 out of 4 – about a B – though it was marred with Ds in Latin and Physics. Rong was supposed to graduate in 2015 but dropped out after his junior year.
In March 2014, he became a client of Cunshande, a company that helps Chinese students get accepted to top U.S. colleges. Cunshande, also known as Transcend Education, is located on the 25th floor of an office tower in the financial district of Shenzhen.
Its founders – Kevin Li and Michael Du – both attended one of America’s top public schools, the University of California, Los Angeles. Li said they began advising Chinese students on applying to American colleges while at UCLA. Du wouldn’t comment other than to say in an email that he is “no longer involved with the operations at Transcend.”
Li and Du opened Transcend in Shenzhen about five years ago. Li said Transcend has about 40 clients a year and charges between $12,000 and $18,000 for its services, which he described as mentoring and counseling students.
A receipt shows that Claren Rong’s parents paid about $13,700 to Transcend. With the company’s help, Rong applied to at least 15 U.S. colleges, emails reviewed by Reuters indicate. He was accepted in 2015 by the University of California, Davis.
In March 2015, more than a hundred U.S. colleges began receiving emails from an anonymous former Transcend employee. The emails included details about 40 Chinese applicants, including Rong.
“I am writing this e-mail to inform you that the student Xuan Rong … under the influence of Cunshande, a company which ghostwrites applications for Chinese students applying to American universities, committed application fraud,” the tipster wrote to some of the schools.
Rong, the tipster alleged, claimed in his college applications that he attended a Chinese high school in downtown Shenzhen, where he maintained an A average in his sophomore and junior years. In fact, the tipster said, Rong was attending MacDuffie in Massachusetts.
FAKING IT: The college application of Claren Rong, pictured here in an 11th grade yearbook photo, contained a fake high school transcript. His family hired a company in China that helped put the application together. REUTERS/Handout
The tipster attached two transcripts for Rong – his real one from MacDuffie, the other from the school in Shenzhen. Both transcripts list grades for his sophomore and junior years, even though Rong didn’t take classes at the Shenzhen school those years.
Admissions offices often lack the staff to pursue such red flags. At UC Davis, where Rong was admitted, 68,519 people applied to attend the school this fall. One of every five were international students. The school has just seven admissions officers on staff to vet those 13,560 international applicants.
Even so, an admissions officer at UC Davis, Mitsuko Leonard, did email the former Transcend employee, promising that “any real evidence you are able to provide will be considered.”
The tipster responded five days later, on March 30, 2015, offering information about 21 students in 217 attached documents. Leonard forwarded the material to the UC president’s office. “Yikes… this is from the anonymous source in China. Please review,” she wrote.
Most of the attachments were different versions of college essays that, the tipster claimed, had been doctored by Transcend employees. They included nine versions of an essay by Rong. The evolving drafts, reviewed by Reuters, display dramatic improvement in grammar and writing. The email also included a “Special Note” about where Rong attended high school.
The tipster alleged that Rong’s parents had obtained “a fake Chinese high school transcript” from a local Chinese high school to “hide his poor” average at MacDuffie. The attachments included his legitimate transcript from the Massachusetts school.
UC Davis didn’t contact the school at that time, and it admitted Rong.
Griffin, MacDuffie’s school head, said a UC Davis representative called months later, in late September, asking about Rong. The call came shortly after Reuters obtained, through a public records request, the correspondence between the admissions office and the Transcend tipster.
A UC Davis spokesman initially told Reuters the university couldn’t comment on specific students. He later said Rong would be leaving the university after the fall semester in December 2015.
Rong declined to comment. His father, Yuanxin Rong, confirmed in an interview in Shenzhen last November that UC Davis had expelled his son. “The university said that we didn’t provide the right information” in his application, he said.
HAWKEYE U: The University of Iowa, based in Iowa City, Iowa, is one of the largest colleges in the Midwest. REUTERS/Koh Gui Qing
“The university said that we didn’t provide the right information. ....We just wanted to get in a better school. ... It’s normal. Anyone would do that.”
Yuanxin Rong, whose son left the University of California, Davis after having submitted a questionable application.
Rong’s father also confirmed that his son submitted a bogus Chinese high school transcript. He said Transcend had advised his family to obtain a transcript from the Chinese high school because of his son’s low grade point average at MacDuffie.
Ketty Kang, director of the international department at Cuiyuan High School in Shenzhen, confirmed that the school issued a transcript for Rong showing he spent his sophomore and junior years there. “I should have added more information to say he wasn’t actually at the school for several years,” she said.
Li, the co-founder of Transcend, initially said he had no knowledge of the Chinese transcript for Rong. Reuters obtained a copy of the transcript, which was a Microsoft Word file. Its metadata – computer information about the document – showed that it had last been saved by Li. Shown a copy of the document and the metadata, Li conceded that Transcend had the fake transcript on file and that he had seen it before. But he said Transcend played no part in obtaining the document.
Li told Reuters the company does not ghostwrite applications. He also said Transcend doesn’t help students create teacher recommendations for themselves. Drafts seen by Reuters of more than 200 recommendation letters written for more than 50 Transcend students suggest otherwise.
The metadata on those documents indicates that they, too, had been stored on Transcend’s computers. Letters of recommendation are customarily confidential, and teachers rarely let anyone change them. The letters disclosed by the tipster bear signs of having been scripted or altered by students or Transcend employees.
Two of the recommendations are for Rong. Both claim he attended Cuiyuan High. One referred to his “outstanding academic performance.” In another, a teacher claimed he had taught Rong math in 11th grade and that he was “a great student.”
In a purported teacher’s recommendation for another student, Li commented in the margins, “This part needs to be expanded.” He added that two other paragraphs could be “combined into one and shortened so we have enough space for this expanded paragraph.”
Shown a copy of that letter, Li said Transcend never changes recommendations. Transcend’s input on that particular letter, he said, was “definitely authorized by the school teacher.”
The teacher says otherwise. Phillip Stout, then a teacher at Shenzhen Middle School, said he did write a letter for the student, whose name Reuters is withholding. But Stout said he never gave a copy of the letter to the student or authorized anyone to change it. He also said he never heard of Li or his company. How Transcend got the letter is a mystery to Stout. “If somebody else is editing it, it’s not something I ever wanted,” Stout said. “It’s upsetting to hear.”
Rong’s father said the family would now try to find another U.S. school for his son. He expressed no remorse about obtaining the fake Chinese transcript.
“We just wanted to get in a better school,” he said. “It’s normal. Anyone would do that.”
“THEY TEMPTED US”
The situation at the University of Iowa illustrates how Chinese cheating-service providers can cause trouble long after admission.
At Iowa, four or five so-called transcript evaluators review international applications from potential freshmen, according to a school spokesman. For the fall 2016 term, nearly 5,000 international students applied, leaving each of the admissions officers to scrutinize on average about a thousand applications.
In 2015, 4,540 international students were enrolled at Iowa. Of those, 2,797 were from China. That’s 9 percent of the school’s student body. Most or all of the students accused of cheating are Chinese nationals.
An email sent on April 25 to faculty members of Iowa’s business school explained how the suspects were caught. The students, wrote Kenneth G. Brown, associate dean at the university’s Tippie College of Business, had taken online examinations monitored by a proctoring services company, ProctorU.
ONGOING INVESTIGATION: Officials at the University of Iowa continue to try to determine the extent of cheating that took place this year and involved at least 30 students.
The contractor discovered that students taking online classes had other people take their exams for them, he wrote. ProctorU is able to monitor students through the cameras mounted in the computers used to take the test. In checking the faces of the exam-takers against the identification photos of the legitimate students, ProctorU came to believe that imposters had stepped in for the students. It then alerted the university.
“Some of these students conducted this type of cheating in more than one class,” Brown wrote. He said that some of the ringers cheated for more than one student. Brown declined to comment. ProctorU confirmed the outlines of how it detected the cheating.
It isn’t clear if the university has identified any of the ringers, known as “gunmen” in China. But the three Chinese students interviewed for this article mentioned several services they had used. The students spoke on the condition that they not be named.
One, a third-year transfer student from a Chinese university, said UI International Student Services took a midterm exam for her in March. In a series of Chinese-language messages via the WeChat app, UI International confirmed to Reuters that it has provided “substitute” course-taking services to students at the University of Iowa. But contradicting the student, UI International denied taking exams for students and said none of its clients had been accused of academic fraud.
UI International told Reuters that it also provides services at a handful of other American colleges, which it declined to name. Its students-for-hire are all undergraduates, UI International said, but not all are Chinese.
“We’re students, too, making a little hard-earned money,” UI International said in the WeChat exchange. “I hope you can have mercy on us in your writing. Don’t wipe us out. Thanks a million.”
Another student caught in the cheating crackdown, a sophomore, said she hired a company that goes by the names Fanyi Translation and Fanyi Creation Translation. Fanyi’s website, fanyishop.com, became inaccessible May 23. It had carried the motto “diligently creating value.”
Its specialties include writing papers for students. “We have native English speakers from the UK and the US who can guarantee the quality of the writing,” the site said. Fanyi charged 5 cents a word for “polishing” an existing piece of writing and 21 cents a word for “gold medal expert service” – editors writing bespoke pieces for the student. Fanyi also said it would create documents for students going abroad, including personal statements and recommendation letters.
Fanyi accepted payment in U.S. and Canadian dollars, British pounds and Chinese renminbi, by Visa, MasterCard and UnionPay, its website said. Reuters was unable to reach the operators of the company.
The transfer student who said she used UI International is a 21-year-old junior. She has been at Iowa for two semesters. She paid $1,200 to UI International to take the midterm exam for her in the Introduction to Law course, she said.
“At the start, I wasn’t looking for someone to take my exams for me,” she said. “But when I did my homework, I discovered the grades I got for my homework were always very poor. Then I began to worry.”
“My family is very strict with me and has very high expectations for my grades,” she said. Her mother teaches at a university back home in China, she said. “My mother’s health is not good, too, and I didn’t want to disappoint her, which led me to make a wrong decision.”
The sophomore student who hired Fanyi Translation said she paid the service $1,400 to take the midterm exam for her in the same law course. The service, she said, “sweet talked and tricked us. They told us they can get As for us – that they can guarantee Bs and strive for As.”
Fanyi delivered on one promise: She got a B on her midterm. But because she was caught cheating, she failed the course.
“We really regret it now,” she said.
A third student, also a sophomore, said he paid $2,400 through PayPal to someone a friend recommended through WeChat. The service would take two online economics classes for him. The sophomore didn’t even know the ringer’s name. A mediocre student, he thought the service would help his grades. He said he recognizes that what he did is wrong.
When the university told him he’d been caught, he said, “it was a bolt out of the blue. I was really scared.”
Now, the student is looking to put the incident behind him. He says he hopes to stay in the United States – and transfer to another school.
Additional reporting by Renee Dudley in Boston and Jane Lanhee Lee in Davis, California.
—————
Deception 101
By Koh Gui Qing in Iowa City, Alexandra Harney in Shanghai, Steve Stecklow in London and James Pomfret in Shenzhen
Photo editing: Chris Helgren
Design by Troy Dunkley
Edited by Blake Morrison
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Isso em grande medida não é corrupção. É sim o satisfazer de algo para o qual existe muita procura. Infelizmente, nesse caso o algo é ilegal. Já existir quem providencie o serviço ... bem, os Chineses neste momento são alucinantemente empreendedores, logo dispõem-se a esforços brutais para providenciar o que quer que alguém queira comprar.
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Eu discordo, para mim é corrupção pura e dura, e uma flecha no coração do capitalismo. É mau porque os menos aptos irão prosseguir os estudos, e duplamente mau, porque haverá indivíduos mais aptos que não entrarão para a universidade mesmo sendo melhores.
cor·rup·ção
(latim corruptio, -onis, deterioração, sedução, depravação)
substantivo feminino
1. Acto ou efeito de corromper ou de se corromper.
2. [Antigo] Deterioração física de uma substância ou de matéria orgânica, por apodrecimento ou oxidação (ex.: após vários meses no mar, a corrupção dos mantimentos era inevitável). = DECOMPOSIÇÃO, PUTREFACÇÃO, PUTRESCÊNCIA
3. Alteração do estado ou das características originais de algo. = ADULTERAÇÃO
4. Comportamento desonesto, fraudulento ou ilegal que implica a troca de dinheiro, valores ou serviços em proveito próprio (ex.: os suspeitos foram detidos sob alegação de corrupção e desvio de fundos).
5. [Figurado] Degradação moral (ex.: corrupção de valores). = DEPRAVAÇÃO, PERVERSÃO
6. Sedução (ex.: o réu foi condenado pela corrupção de pessoa menor de 14 anos).
"corrupção", in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa [em linha], 2008-2013, http://www.priberam.pt/dlpo/corrup%C3%A7%C3%A3o (http://www.priberam.pt/dlpo/corrup%C3%A7%C3%A3o) [consultado em 30-05-2016].
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Não é corrupção do sistema que recebe os alunos. O sistema que recebe os alunos não recebe dinheiro para mudar as suas opções.
Não deixa de ser uma fraude a esse sistema, mas não é corrupção do mesmo.
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Não é uma flecha no capitalismo. É certo e sabido que a venda de produtos e serviços pode sempre incluir produtos e serviços nefastos, desde que exista procura para os mesmos. Isto com ou sem capitalismo -- o capitalismo é apenas uma forma de usar capital em conjunto (para comprar) com trabalho de forma a providenciar produtos e serviços, sejam estes quais forem. Isto é tão mau para o capitalismo, como é mau para uma siderurgia que se façam balas com aço.
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Eu estou a falar de corrupção de um indivíduo que recorre a estes meios para forçar a sua entrada na universidade. Não estou a falar do sistema de admissão. Naturalmente esse sistema claramente não é perfeito e tem limitações. Mas obviamente não é corrupto. Embora esteja a ser permeável a indivíduos corruptos.
E é uma flecha no coração do capitalismo, porque se o mesmo não estiver permanentemente atento à corrupção - combatendo-a, acaba por ser desvirtuado.
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http://www.france24.com/en/20161212-imf-chief-lagarde-trial-payout-french-tycoon-tapie (http://www.france24.com/en/20161212-imf-chief-lagarde-trial-payout-french-tycoon-tapie)
Lagarde, the first woman to be appointed IMF chief, is being tried for her role in a 2008 arbitration ruling that handed 403 million euros ($425 million) to a French business magnate, Bernard Tapie, an ally of then president Nicolas Sarkozy.
Tapie, a flamboyant tycoon and former TV star, had sued French bank Credit Lyonnais for its handling of the sale of his majority stake in sportswear company Adidas in the mid-1990s.
When Lagarde became finance minister in 2007, the lengthy legal battle between Tapie and the public bank was still unresolved, and she ordered it to be settled through an unusual private arbitration panel, instead of regular courts, against the advice of her own staff.
The choice of arbitration proved disastrous for the state by leading to the massive payout to Tapie from public funds.
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A Lagarde foi condenada por negligência, embora não tenha nenhum tipo de penalização (multa ou prisão). Alguns dos comentários do acórdão são severos, mas no final não houve pena efectiva.
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Mas uma censura pública deveria ter consequências,
pelo menos de carácter social, tipo pedidos ou exigências
de demissão nos cargos em exercício.
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Fala -se de corrupção aqui, mas nos países de leste a corrupção é maior ainda.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/a-whiff-of-corruption-in-orban-s-hungary-a-1129713.html (http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/a-whiff-of-corruption-in-orban-s-hungary-a-1129713.html)
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Esta história dos offshores fala -se de muita grana e poucos donos.