Elaborate marble facade of NYSE (New York Stock Exchange) seen from the intersection of Broad and Wall Streets.

It is a stronghold for the preservation of our funds, our dreams, and a hedge against inflation that is the American banking system. Our banks are the strongest and most regulated of any institution in the nation, save hospitals. For the most part our banking system is hard to defraud, but some have and could.

As I look back in history, and see the devastation left behind by the Russian Mob after they pillaged the banks around the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Between 1993 and 1997 the gangsters – most of whom were former government workers and ex-military – took to the occupation's associated with what we call 'black-marketeering' and other such underhanded dealings as well. The one thing these criminal organizations undertook and became specialized at was gaining control of the banks in the new Russian Federation.

They were no longer content with just depositing their money in the banks; the Russian Mob went after total control of the banks and seized their assets through sheer force, brutality, and guile; in most cases. They wanted the banks to use for their various illegal schemes, including the most profitable scheme of all; money laundering for the drug trade.

The taken banks –depleted of their assets soon fell into disreputable standing – their value deflated to the point that they could not be used, so consequently these banks failed to be reliable for legal transactions. They fail, as a matter of fact, or so it seems they are only good for the receivership of funds to be diverted elsewhere.

Now that the Russian Mob has moved into the suburbs of America, you cannot help but wonder… Has bank failure come to the United States by way of organized crime? It did happen to the Russian Federation.

In the past eight years, we have seen the failure of close to 40 banks insured by the F.D.I.C. Many of these banks have failed for nothing more than mismanagement in the form of bad loans to people who could not afford those loans.

However, some of the failures have been earmarked as fraud. Suspicions of fraud have been raised by several organizations including the F.D.I.C., the F.B.I., and the attorney general of the United States and those investigations are at present ongoing and underway. One of the problems is that sorting through the data takes a lot of time and is very tedious. That is one of the other things the gangsters are skilled at is the "paper chase." Remember the gasoline tax fraud scheme; that was a 'blizzard of paper' one investigator said.

Meanwhile, more banks fail and the investigative process continues. We all hope it will not be too late before the true cause of these failures comes to the light of day.

Fraud – this label is consistent with the philosophy of Russian / American organized crime – they take over a bank and destroy the institution from with-in. This activity is classic and holds true to form to many of the places were the Russian Mob has resided in Europe and Eurasia.

The number of Russians who have immigrated to America since 1990 is close to 200,000. The State Department suspects the Russian government sent us their hardened criminals who were incarcerated in their prisons, first, then their political offenders next and so forth.