In subsequent chapters a more detailed description of the program's organiza

tion and structure and its efforts in meeting program goals is presented. Achievements at both the national and district levels are noted and issues affecting the program's continued success are discussed.

CHAPTER II
NATIONAL PROGRAM RESPONSIBILITIES AND
OPERATIONAL FRAMEWORK FOR THE OFFICE OF ECONOMIC CRIME ENFORCEMENT

NATIONAL PROGRAM RESPONSIBILITIES AND ORGANIZATION

In establishing the ECE program, Attorney General Order 817-79 provided for

the creation of OECE within CRM to administer the provisions of the Order.

Located in Washington, D.C., OECE is the headquarters of the program, responsible for overall program implementation and administration. Presently, it

is staffed by a Director, a Deputy Director (as of July 1, 1980), an Informa

tion Specialist and a secretary. The Director currently carries major

responsibility for establishing new ECE units, staffing each unit with a Specialist, providing supervision and guidance in implementing the program at the unit level, training, maintaining liaison with prosecution, enforcement, program and other agencies' headquarters personnel, analyzing white-collar crime information, and preparing program reports. The burden of these responsibilities has been eased somewhat with the addition of the Deputy Director.

Within the current organization structure of CRM, OECE forms a bridge between the Fraud Section and the Public Integrity Section of CRM (See Appendix VI). This initial arrangement was partially the result of budgetary considerations and the notion that OECE had its major, practical responsibilities in the areas of fraud and public corruption. This arrangement does, however,

create an ambiguous reporting responsibility for the Director of OECE.

Although the Office is planned as a separate decision unit for purposes of

the FY 1982 budget, this will not in itself clarify the line reporting relation

ship of OECE within CRM. Therefore, the need for CRM management to clarify OECE's reporting responsibilities continues to exist.

The national program responsibilities, performed by OECE with the assistance

of other sections of CRM, include the following major functions:

To create 30 ECE geographic regions for the program's national scope;
To select site locations and Specialists for the ECE units;
To coordinate the ECE program activities in all Federal judicial
districts and CRM through the ECE Specialist and their units;
To establish a reporting system including specific information

regarding investigative and litigative activities of the units;

To publish an ECE Bulletin describing: newly developed techniques in the areas of prevention, detection, investigation, prosecution and sentencing; significant cases; and relevant changes within the inves

tigative and regulatory agencies;

To arrange training for investigative, program and prosecution personnel in the most recent developments in the investigation and

To collect and maintain relevant statistical data on the performance of the program in fraud and corruption matters in order to develop a

white-collar crime information system, and indicate areas for priority

treatment;

To prepare periodic reports to the Attorney General including an

annual overall report of the program; and

To obtain additional prosecutorial resources from the Department, as available, to assist with the complex, quality cases developed at the

district level.

NATIONAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS

During the past 19 months (February 9, 1979 through September 1, 1980), OECE has

made substantial progress in fulfilling its responsibilities to implement an effective ECE program. In support of this conclusion, there are described below some of the major achievements at the national level:

Selecting ECE Units: Following the formal creation of the ECE program the OECE engaged in a two pronged effort establishing ECE Units and implementing program objectives. The first phase of the OECE implementation plan was initiated by establishing seven ECE units between April and July 1979.

The process of selecting Federal districts within which to establish the

initial seven ECE units focused on medium sized OUSAS* (determined by the

number of AUSAS and overall caseload), considered the history of the OUSA's approach to white-collar crime, and took into account the economic conditions

and flow of trade in multi-district regions.

In addition, it was designed to limit the Specialist's ECE region to Federal

judicial districts in not more than two States. Finally, establishment of the

*

California was selected in order to assess the differing needs and approaches of operating an ECE unit in a large OUSA, which had an existing special unit prosecuting white-collar crimes.

units was contingent on the U.S. Attorney's support and adoption of the

program's concept, goals and objectives, operational methodology, and

district priorities.

The following chart identifies the number of districts, the States within

which the ECE Specialist is to operate, and the relative size of each OUSA

in terms of AUSAs and caseload for the initial seven ECE units.

Originally, the ECE unit in Denver was to cover Colorado and New Mexico, but the consideration of other factors led to a decision to restructure its geographic area. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania was selected to replace the Birmingham, Alabama site in the original plan until a Specialist could be found for that

unit. *** Criminal and civil cases filed by the OUSA for FY 1979. These figures

are provided to show the relative size of the caseload for the selected OUSAs and do not consider the quality of the cases filed.