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The Letters - Update December 21, 2008

By the way my RFI letter was identical to my friends except for one paragraph that pertained to my specific information. No amounts were mentioned at all on my letter.

"It has come to our attention that on January 18, 2005, & March 16, 2005, you purchased Cuban Cigars from a company located in Hong Kong."

Naturally I didn't purchase Cuban Cigars from Hong Kong. At most I can remember would have been either a humidor or briar wood for carving pipes. But then again I don't track my transactions or keep records on such things.

Just a little more information.
 
Read the thread and I want to thank those who put in the time and effort to keep all of us informed. I'll be gettin my smokes at the local B&M until the embargo lifts.
 
thompsonmkt said:
I appreciate all the information on this thread. I was the lucky recipient of a certified "RFI" letter from the Dept of Treas yesterday. I have done a bit of web-research and mostly seems like it is a fishing expedition on the part of the OFAC. I have also spoken to a close friend who got the same letter in September of 2006. Our "transactions in question" according to the letters were in 2004 & 2005. He had an attorney draft a response and sent that response in early October of 2005 and has not heard back since. On my instincts and his advice I hired an attorney today to do just the same. My response will be - of course the truth - that I have no knowledge, records nor information and I have done nothing wrong regarding this letter and to contact my attorney with any further requests/actions.

I will update the form with any further information/actions in my case or any that I have first hand knowledge of.

Is there anyone out there that has first hand knowledge of a letter and what has happened? I have read a lot of others guessing and references from OFAC website, which, don't get me wrong is interesting, but seems to be a lack of people who are involved actually keeping us up to date.

Also, I don't care to debate with anyone whether I have or have not done anything wrong or whether I would again if I had. I am not here to be judged or get legal advice (I will get that from my attorney). I am glad to share information though.

Thanks to (most) all in this thread for the information.

- Mike
Click to expand...
Mike,

Thank you for sharing this information. It is perhaps understandable that individuals who have received the R-Letter would be mum on the proceedings. There is nothing but uncertainty, fear, and doubt surrounding this issue. Since it seems like there is no "safe" place to discuss specifics and actions in detail away from the potentially watching eyes of OFAC, people have chosen to keep mum. For the most part. You are one of only two cases of which I know that the affected individual has made his plans and actions public.

Here is a summary of the other person's case to date:

October 2006 - Received R-Letter claiming 2 purchases (no dollar amounts) from HK region spread out over 2005
Recipient decided to not respond.
December 2006 - Received Prepenalty Notice claiming 3 purchases from HK region for $250, $420, $500 and that the preliminary fine would be $1,170, which could be negotiated or disputed via letter or hearing.
February 2007 - Recipient responded, admitting to 2 purchases of under $250 each and proposing a negotiated settlement of $500.
March 2007 - No response from OFAC yet.

Wilkey
 
Update:
My attorney is going to attempt to call the person at the Treasury Dept. that sent the letter and signed it this week. He is going to ask what it is about and what sort of information they might have. I doubt the call will be taken, but we will see.

more to come...

Ginseng said:
thompsonmkt said:
I appreciate all the information on this thread. I was the lucky recipient of a certified "RFI" letter from the Dept of Treas yesterday. I have done a bit of web-research and mostly seems like it is a fishing expedition on the part of the OFAC. I have also spoken to a close friend who got the same letter in September of 2006. Our "transactions in question" according to the letters were in 2004 & 2005. He had an attorney draft a response and sent that response in early October of 2005 and has not heard back since. On my instincts and his advice I hired an attorney today to do just the same. My response will be - of course the truth - that I have no knowledge, records nor information and I have done nothing wrong regarding this letter and to contact my attorney with any further requests/actions.

I will update the form with any further information/actions in my case or any that I have first hand knowledge of.

Is there anyone out there that has first hand knowledge of a letter and what has happened? I have read a lot of others guessing and references from OFAC website, which, don't get me wrong is interesting, but seems to be a lack of people who are involved actually keeping us up to date.

Also, I don't care to debate with anyone whether I have or have not done anything wrong or whether I would again if I had. I am not here to be judged or get legal advice (I will get that from my attorney). I am glad to share information though.

Thanks to (most) all in this thread for the information.

- Mike
Click to expand...
Mike,

Thank you for sharing this information. It is perhaps understandable that individuals who have received the R-Letter would be mum on the proceedings. There is nothing but uncertainty, fear, and doubt surrounding this issue. Since it seems like there is no "safe" place to discuss specifics and actions in detail away from the potentially watching eyes of OFAC, people have chosen to keep mum. For the most part. You are one of only two cases of which I know that the affected individual has made his plans and actions public.

Here is a summary of the other person's case to date:

October 2006 - Received R-Letter claiming 2 purchases (no dollar amounts) from HK region spread out over 2005
Recipient decided to not respond.
December 2006 - Received Prepenalty Notice claiming 3 purchases from HK region for $250, $420, $500 and that the preliminary fine would be $1,170, which could be negotiated or disputed via letter or hearing.
February 2007 - Recipient responded, admitting to 2 purchases of under $250 each and proposing a negotiated settlement of $500.
March 2007 - No response from OFAC yet.

Wilkey
Click to expand...
 
thompsonmkt said:
Update:
My attorney is going to attempt to call the person at the Treasury Dept. that sent the letter and signed it this week. He is going to ask what it is about and what sort of information they might have. I doubt the call will be taken, but we will see.

more to come...
Click to expand...
Thank you very much for keeping us in the loop.

I wanted to address an apparent report of an R-letter being received for purchases made between Dec 05 and Mar 06. Although this was posted in open forum, I followed up with the poster to verify this and was given contradictory information suggesting the actual time period of interest was Jan 05 to Mar 05. Further attempts to clarify and confirm have not received a response. At this point, I would not regard this as reliable evidence that the OFAC time frame of interest extends into 2006.

Wilkey
 
I have received confirmation from the individual I mentioned in the post before this one.

The period of interest was confirmed to be Jan 05 to Mar 05.

To date, no letters have been publically reported alleging purchases in 2006.

Wilkey
 
Wilkey you may want to edit your post to Mar 05 if I understand you correctly :)
 
Either way it appears as if they (OFAC) are just working there way on up through the dates, and eventually they'll get caught up to the present day. At least it seems that way if the first reports of letters were from 04, and now we have at least one possible from 05.
 
Gonz said:
Either way it appears as if they (OFAC) are just working there way on up through the dates, and eventually they'll get caught up to the present day. At least it seems that way if the first reports of letters were from 04, and now we have at least one possible from 05.
Click to expand...
Andy,

That doesn't seem to be the case. In other words, some of the early letters addressed dates well into 2005. Keep in mind, data is sparse so confidence is low.

Wilkey
 
Like many others, I have followed this topic with great interest across the cigar boards. I, too, have speculated as to the (source) location and time range of the purchases being focused upon by OFAC.

I don't know the first thing of the inner workings of the banking system. Yet, I wonder..... Is it possible that OFAC happened to obtain a single hard drive of transaction records? Transactions that were made to a particular region of vendors and within a limited time frame? It could explain why it has affected more than one vendor within that region and has not escaped a limited range of purchases as of yet.

This is just my speculation. If I am correct, it would be interesting to see what might follow. Heck, it's gonna be interesting nonetheless. This has the potential for case law review if the floodgates open up. Or they may stop at this time frame and move their interests on to other things afterwards. The interests of special enforcement agencies are continuously evolving and outright changing.

Please excuse me if I am covering old or excessively elementary ground. I do follow this topic, but not for every single post. This thread, and that of the Australian board, has grown to be quite long.
 
cabaiguan juan said:
Smok said:
Does this mean some relief is in sight? ???

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070320/ap_on_...ecurity_letters
Click to expand...

I dont know, they were talking about the FBI, not OFAC. But who knows, could be the first step.
Click to expand...



Here's another site that has some info in dealing with letters from the gov. The site deals with travel, but it appears the discussions cover a much longer range of time thus the ramifications for not responding to a letter inquiry seem better illustrated here:
http://www.ibike.org/cuba/ofac/cuba-harass...htm#Pre-penalty
 
I like the part of the return form letter where you request the gov't furnish information - I can see the agent hitting the delete button on your file after thinking about the paperwork involved :)
 
What if you receive a package from over seas, and on the outside of the package it has stickers relating to non-cigar items. Customs goes through it, sees that they are actually ISOM's, packages it back up with the official custom's tape, and then sends it to you. Would you receive a letter? Would it make sense if they still sent the package? ???
 
Wow, Rod. I think you should count yourself lucky. A good friend of mine works for Customs at the AZ-Mexico border, I'll ask him and let you know. He's said in the past that they don't really communicate with OFAC, so I doubt that you'll get a letter from OFAC. I think Customs only sends letter/postcard if they actually seize the products and since they didn't take anything, you should be good to go.
 
Rod said:
What if you receive a package from over seas, and on the outside of the package it has stickers relating to non-cigar items. Customs goes through it, sees that they are actually ISOM's, packages it back up with the official custom's tape, and then sends it to you. Would you receive a letter? Would it make sense if they still sent the package? ???
Click to expand...
Same exact thing happened to my friend.....the package was opened, repacked with official customs tape. No letter yet. Guess they didnt like the Cohiba EL? *Hey, its another sucker who bought a Cohiba!!!*

Regards.
 
Rod said:
What if you receive a package from over seas, and on the outside of the package it has stickers relating to non-cigar items. Customs goes through it, sees that they are actually ISOM's, packages it back up with the official custom's tape, and then sends it to you. Would you receive a letter? Would it make sense if they still sent the package? ???
Click to expand...


Strayvector said:
Wow, Rod. I think you should count yourself lucky. A good friend of mine works for Customs at the AZ-Mexico border, I'll ask him and let you know. He's said in the past that they don't really communicate with OFAC, so I doubt that you'll get a letter from OFAC. I think Customs only sends letter/postcard if they actually seize the products and since they didn't take anything, you should be good to go.
Click to expand...
Right. If past experience is any guide, this Customs interception (but not confiscation) will not result in any follow-up action.

Wilkey
 
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