Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has asked top government officials to explain the absence of Wall Street prosecutions. In a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Justice Department and the Federal Reserve, Warren questioned the government’s preference for reaching settlements with big banks accused of financial wrongdoing instead of holding them to account in court. Warren writes: “If large financial institutions can break the law and accumulate millions in profits and, if they get caught, settle by paying out of those profits, they do not have much incentive to follow the law.”