Original Article on The New York Times

The former ABN Amro Bank agreed to pay $500 million for violating the Bank Secrecy Act, the Justice Department said Monday, Bloomberg News reported.The bank has accepted responsibility for its conduct, the department said in a news release. From 1995 through December 2005, the bank altered payment documents so they did not include references to countries under sanction by the American government, according to the department.Even after the bank put in controls so the records would not be changed to hide activity, a limited number of transactions with such countries occurred in 2006 and 2007, the department said.ABN Amro, now part of the Royal Bank of Scotland, said in April 2007 that it had set aside $500 million for an eventual settlement i...(read more)