Pair indicted for tax fraud in US
A Swiss lawyer and a former UBS banker have been indicted in the United States for allegedly aiding Americans to evade taxes by hiding assets in banks in Switzerland.
Documents from a South Florida court allege that the lawyer advised clients on how to set up sham offshore corporations and trusts to hide assets.
The pair are also alleged to have told a New York businessman that they had paid a Swiss government official a $45,000 (SFr47,000) bribe for information on whether his account would be revealed to US investigators.
Both men face charges of conspiring to defraud the US, which carries a potential five-year prison sentence. Both are currently in Switzerland.
The banker worked in UBS’s cross-border banking business until 2002 when he left for a job at Switzerland’s Neue Zuercher Bank. The indictment says clients were encouraged to move assets from UBS to the NZB, on the grounds that the smaller bank was less likely to come under scrutiny.
The NZB announced on Friday that he had been fired as a result of the court indictment.
Thursday’s indictment came a day after the Swiss and US governments unveiled an agreement in which UBS would divulge names of 4,450 wealthy Americans suspected of dodging taxes.
Four UBS clients have pleaded guilty to tax charges as part of an on-going tax fraud probe by the Internal Revenue Service. The Justice Department said earlier this week about 150 others remained under criminal investigation.
swissinfo.ch and agencies
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.