HSBC Holdings Plc’s $1.9 billion agreement with the U.S. to resolve charges it enabled Latin American drug cartels to launder billions of dollars was approved by a federal judge, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. U.S. District Judge John Gleeson in Brooklyn, New York, signed off on July 1 on a deferred-prosecution agreement, a critical component of the London-based bank’s settlement. The order was filed more than six months after the government announced reaching an accord with the bank. Both sides argued that Judge Gleeson didn’t have the power to approve or reject the terms they came to, the judge said in his order. “A pending criminal case is not window dressing” Judge Gleeson wrote. “Nor is the court, to borrow a famous phrase, a potted plant. By placing a criminal matter on the docket of a federal court, the parties have subjected their DPA to the legitimate exercise of the court’s authority.”
