Three Credit Suisse Bankers Indicted By U.S. For Tax Evasion Services
FAIRFIELD, Connecticut (Lynnley Browning) - U.S. authorities indicted three Credit Suisse AG private bankers, one a senior executive, on Thursday, toughening their stance against the bank for allegedly helping wealthy Americans to evade taxes.
Federal prosecutors in Alexandria, Virginia, filed criminal charges against Markus Walder, the former head of North America Offshore Banking and a former senior Credit Suisse executive; Susanne D. Rüegg Meier, a former manager; and Andreas Bachmann, a former banker at a subsidiary of the bank. Also charged was Josef Dorig, the founder of a Swiss trust company that worked with the bank.
While the charges did not name the bank in question, a government person briefed on the matter identified it as Credit Suisse.
Asked about the indictment, Victoria Harmon, a spokeswoman for Credit Suisse, said in a statement that "Credit Suisse is committed to a fully compliant cross-border business. Subject to our Swiss legal obligations and throughout this process we will continue to cooperate with the U.S. authorities in an effort to resolve these matters."
The four individuals were charged with conspiring to defraud the United States, the Justice Department and Internal Revenue Service by helping wealthy Americans to evade taxes. Walder, a managing director, was accused of, among other things, lying to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2005 and 2007 and to the IRS about the bank's activities with U.S. customers and on U.S. soil.
