FBI white-collar crime focus said lacking

WASHINGTON, Oct. 19 (UPI) -- The FBI lacks the resources to investigate burgeoning white-collar crime because it was refocused to fight terrorism after 2001, critics say.

With the global economic crisis triggering hundreds of cases of financial wrongdoing, the FBI is struggling to keep up with the workload because its criminal investigation workforce was slashed and transferred in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, current and former officials told The New York Times Sunday.

The agency's white-collar crime-fighting resources are so depleted that company executives say they can't get the FBI's attention even on fraud cases involving millions of dollars, the newspaper reported.

"Clearly, we have felt the effects of moving resources from criminal investigations to national security," John Miller, an assistant director at the FBI, told The Times. "In white-collar crime, while we initiated fewer cases over all, we targeted the areas where we could have the biggest impact."

Some say a faster reaction to white-collar crime could have deterred some of the financing schemes that eventually triggered the mortgage meltdown.

"They were very late to the game," said U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., who has sparred with the FBI over its response to the mortgage crisis.