The State Government has moved to make money laundering a major crime in Western Australia, with penalties of up to 20 years' imprisonment.
Attorney General Joe Berinson said legislation introduced today would make money laundering a specific offence under the Criminal Code.
This would enhance the ability of the courts to order illegally gained profits and assets to be forfeited.
Money laundering refers to action taken to hide the nature or source of property or cash gained from criminal activities.
The new offence would cover proceeds from drug trafficking and also non-drug offences, and would augment Commonwealth laws controlling banks and dealing with the reporting of cash transactions.
Mr Berinson said criminals who laundered money were already indirectly targeted under the Crimes (Confiscation of Profits) Act which provided for the forfeiture of money and property acquired through criminal activity.
The creation of a specific money laundering offence would strengthen and expand these provisions.
The move was also part of a process to enable the Federal Government to ratify the United Nations Convention Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, signed by Australia in 1989.
The Convention requires countries to establish as criminal offences conduct which involves the conversion, transfer, concealment or disguise of property which is the proceeds of offences involving illicit cultivation, production, or manufacture of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances, or property derived from those proceeds.
Under the WA legislation, Mr Berinson said the Crown would have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that property was derived from an indictable offence. In defence, the accused could show he or she did not know, believe or suspect, or have reasonable grounds to believe or suspect, the money or property was the proceeds of an offence.
