The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) has announced that the Western Union Remission Fund has begun to distribute about US$40 million from a sum forfeited by Western Union to about 25,000 victims located in the Caribbean, the United States and other places.
The DOJ says these victims stand to recover the full amount of their losses.
It says this is the first distribution in the second phase of the Western Union Remission distributions.
The first phase of distributions paid in excess of $365 million to more than 148,000 victims, all of whom received full compensation for their losses.
It was in 2017 that Western Union entered into a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) with the United States.
The DOJ says, pursuant to the DPA, Western Union acknowledged responsibility for its "criminal conduct, which included violations of the Bank Secrecy Act and aiding and abetting wire fraud."
The company agreed to forfeit $586 million, which has been made available to compensate victims of the international consumer fraud scheme through the remission process.
The Justice Department anticipates authorizing more distributions for victims in the coming months.
The second phase of the Western Union Remission scheme was opened in March last year to provide victims who had not filed petitions in the first phase of distributions an opportunity to file for remission.
The Justice Department says it continues to accept petitions for remission from those victimized by the scheme.
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