Articles built around one person or family: what the public record says about them, and what it leaves open.
In 2019 the US Treasury sanctioned Kassem Chams and his licensed exchange house in Chtaura, Lebanon, alleging drug-proceeds laundering and transfers for Hezbollah; Chams denied it. The designation, the European trial before it, how exchange houses settle value, and Lebanon’s banking collapse.
Ayman Joumaa was designated by the US Treasury in 2011 and indicted the same year on charges of coordinating cocaine shipments for Mexico’s Los Zetas and laundering the proceeds. This article follows the designation, the indictment and the Lebanese Canadian Bank case built around West African car lots, and separates what officials alleged about Hezbollah from what any court found.