The Baltimore Sun reported today on the amount of fraud that has occurred in the federal bailout program which began late last year.  According to the article:

“Investigators said Monday that they have opened 20 criminal probes into possible securities fraud, tax law violations, insider trading and mortgage modification fraud”

Neal Barofsky, the special inspector general overseeing the bailout program, has said that these are just the first invesigations, he expects more to follow.  He expects indictments to occur later this year.

The article reports that:

“The report lays out just how complicated the program has become. What started out last October as a single-purpose $750 billion effort to buy toxic securities has morphed into 12 separate programs that covers up to $3 trillion in direct spending, loans and loan guarantees.

The program has now committed an amount equal to the entire annual federal budget.”

The amount of fraud could run into the tens of billions of dollars.  This is our tax money we are talking about.  It may be complicated to monitor all the money and all the programs, but part of the job of the government is to do just that and do it well.