UBS client charged in tax probe gets bail
An accountant, the first United States citizen charged in a large tax investigation against Swiss bank UBS, has been released on $12 million (SFr13.8 million) bail.
He was among around 300 American account holders whose names were handed over to the US authorities by Switzerland and UBS, in a deal which also requires the bank to pay $780 million in fines and restitution.
The judge set the amount so high because of the risk that the accountant, a dual US-South African citizen, might flee the country.
He is set to answer charges of allegedly filing a false 2007 tax return by failing to disclose incomes from his UBS accounts. This carries a three-year prison sentence.
In a separate case, another US judge on Wednesday dismissed claims against several banks, including UBS, in lawsuits seeking monetary damages against companies accused of aiding South Africa’s former apartheid system of racial segregation.
“Corporate defendants accused of merely doing business with the apartheid government of South Africa have been dismissed,” said judge Shira Scheindlin in her ruling.
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