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Unlicensed Money Transmitters Sentenced
for Sending Millions of Dollars to Yemen



BUFFALO, New York (ICE) -- United States Attorney Terrance P. Flynn and Peter J. Smith, special agent in charge of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Office of Investigations in Buffalo announced that two individuals convicted of illegally transmitting money to Yemen received lengthy prison sentences. The money transmitting business was illegal because it was not licensed under New York State law and unregistered under federal law. U.S. District Judge William Skretny sentenced the three Lackawanna men.

  • Mohamed Albanna was sentenced to five years imprisonment and three years supervised release.
  • Ali A. Albanna received a sentence of 56 months imprisonment and two years supervised release.
  • Ali Taher Elbaneh received was given one-year probation, with six months home detention.

Smith said, "Money transmittal businesses that operate underground and outside the law pose significant homeland security threats. As we have seen in the past, these types of businesses can be and have been exploited by criminal organizations and even terrorist groups to move funds virtually anywhere in the world with no questions asked. Closing down this vulnerability is a priority for ICE."

Judge Skretny also signed orders directing Mohamed Albanna to forfeit $100,000, Ali A. Albanna to forfeit $50,000 and Ali Taher Elbaneh to forfeit $50,000. Assistant United States Attorney Timothy C. Lynch said the defendants pled guilty this June 23 to operating an illegal money transmitting business from November 1, 2001, until December 17, 2002.

Flynn said the maximum penalty faced by each defendant was five years imprisonment, but that, in accordance with the written plea agreements filed June 23, Mohamed Albanna agreed to a sentence of five years, Ali A. Albanna agreed to a sentence of at least 51 months, and that there was no sentencing agreement with respect to Ali Taher Elbaneh.

Flynn said the illegal money transmitting business was operated principally by Mohamed Albanna and Ali A. Albanna from the premises of Queen City Cigarettes and Candy, a wholesale distribution business located at 1282 Clinton Street in Buffalo, New York.

At the sentencing Assistant United States Attorney Timothy Lynch said the money transmitting business operated by the defendants transmitted millions of dollars from the Queen City business in Buffalo to Yemen, and received transmissions from Yemen in the years 2001 and 2002. Lynch said Ali Taher Elbaneh assisted Mohamed Albanna and Ali A. Albanna in the operation of the business.

Mr. Lynch also pointed out that Ali A. Albanna personally handled a $1,500 transfer from Yahya Goba in Western New York to Kamal Derwish in Yemen, which took place after Mr. Goba was being investigated for attending a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan.

Responding to comments made on behalf of Mohamed Albanna, Lynch told the court Albanna knew about federal registration requirements, and also taught his customers about how to structure transactions to avoid reporting requirements for money transfers of more than $10,000. The prosecutor noted there were large monetary transfers that law enforcement would have investigated if they had not been split into smaller parts. Also, Lynch told Judge Skretny that the defendants money transmitting business grew from about $200,000 in 1999 to $3 million in 2002. For nearly all of 2002, Mr. Lynch said, Mohamed Albanna knew about the licensing requirement.

U.S. Attorney Flynn noted that on a specific occasion in September 2002, the defendants illegal money transmitting business conducted an $11,000 cash transmission from Yemen to Buffalo, and failed to report that transmission, as required for transactions of more than $10,000. Mr. Flynn said cash transactions must be reported to the IRS if the amount of the transaction is more than $10,000.

Flynn also noted that Ali A. Albanna admitted in his plea agreement that in March of 2002, he handled the money transfer from Yahya Goba in the Western District of New York, to Kamal Derwish in Yemen, but that, instead of identifying the sender as Yahya Goba and the recipient as Kamal Derwish, Ali A. Albanna entered the name of a Goba relative as the sender, and the name Abdulwali Kushasha as the recipient in Queen City money transmission ledgers. Flynn said Kushasha has been charged in this case as a co-conspirator, but has not been arrested and remains a fugitive.

Flynn said this case also involved over $300,000 in forfeitures and that, prior to the guilty pleas, a total of $179,736 was forfeited by the government. Flynn said that about $53,000 of that total was cash found in a safe at Queen City during the execution of a search warrant by federal agents on December 17, 2002, and that the remaining $126,000 was seized from Queen City's bank account that was used to facilitate the illegal money transmitting business. Mohamed Albanna also has agreed to forfeit an additional $100,000; Ali A. Albanna an additional $50,000, and Ali Taher Elbaneh an additional $10,000.

Judge Skretny permitted Mohamed Albanna and Ali A. Albanna to surrender voluntarily to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons to commence serve of their prison sentences.

The sentences were the result of an investigation by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Internal Revenue Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the United States Secret Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.