The lawsuit alleges that by participating in the money laundering scheme of the cartels, HSBC knowingly contributed directly to the international drug and trafficking trade, including the “brutal acts” that accompanied it, during the period of 2010 to 2011. The London-based bank, which was already being monitored for its involvement in money laundering schemes, had paid nearly $2 billion in penalties in December 2012 to resolve charges that it failed to stop hundreds of millions of dollars in drug money from flowing through the bank from Mexico, and it promised to fix the problems.