#MOVIE ABACUS BANK SERIAL#
This is not like they were serial killers.
“At the same time, the fact is that this was a financial crime. “It really was quite rare and outrageous that they would take these people who had already pleaded and brought them back in and just chain them for the spectacle,” he said.
#MOVIE ABACUS BANK TV#
Members of the family, who’d been indicted, reported to the court then shackled and paraded in front of TV cameras something that shocked and appalled the film’s producer, Mark Mitten. “If anything, they tried to use that to make this community kind of look worse and to make this bank look worse to win the case.” “The prosecution showed no real interest or inclination to understand that,” James said. And also, a profound misunderstanding of the way it is in an immigrant community – particularly one at the more or less bottom rung of American society, working in cash economies and trying to sort of gain a foothold in this country.” “Unintended as it might be in that a feeling that this bank was one that would be safe to go after, that the Chinese American community, being politically disenfranchised, would not be a problem. “But I also think there was a real racism at work here,” he continued. Ambition to be the guy who actually brought a bank to its knees in the wake of the 2008 crisis because no big bank, that had happened to, so I think that clouded his understanding of what was going on, really, here,” James said. “I think the DA’s vision in terms of deciding to prosecute this case was clouded by ambition. The District Attorney was also taking an interest – and after five years, it launched an indictment against the bank, claiming management must have been complicit.ĭirector Steve James followed the family’s journey, spending almost every day with them as they prepared for the fight of their lives to clear their names. They brought in outside investigators and reported the findings to both regulators and law enforcement.
#MOVIE ABACUS BANK FULL#
The bank’s management reported the issue and undertook a full investigation. When they discovered that one of the bank’s loan officers was allegedly committing fraud, he was fired. It had one of the lowest default rates in the country.ĬGTN sat down with Steve James, director of “Abacus: Small Enough to Jail” and the Sung family about their experience fighting off criminal charges against their family bank in the wake… For years, they helped provide mortgages to Chinese immigrants and those working in a cash economy in and around Chinatown.
He runs it with the help of his daughters. It’s hoping to win Best Documentary (Feature) at this year’s Academy Awards in Hollywood.Ībacus Federal Savings Bank was founded by a Chinese immigrant, Thomas Sung. The film, ‘Abacus: Small Enough to Jail,’ tells the story of that bank’s fight against prosecutors.
With many decrying the lack of legal action being down to a ‘too big to fail’ attitude (the idea that prosecuting huge banks with trillion dollar businesses would lead to more financial turmoil), anger was leveled at the perceived lack of justice.Īnd New York’s District Attorney decided to go after a federal bank based in the city’s Chinatown district. Yet, no single bank has ever been prosecuted. It’s been 10 years since the financial crash that began in the United States but was felt across the world.īad banking practices were blamed – specifically, the selling of toxic mortgages – with billions of dollars lost and a huge spike in home repossessions and foreclosures.
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