Ex-UBS Banker Tax Trial Rides on Underling’s Credibility
Raoul Weil, once the head of UBS AG ’s global wealth management business, faces a criminal trial that may turn on the credibility of a former subordinate who says he and Weil helped Americans evade taxes.
Jury selection is set to begin today in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where Weil was indicted in 2008 on a charge that he conspired to help 17,000 U.S. taxpayers hide $20 billion in accounts from the Internal Revenue Service.
He is the highest-ranking official among three dozen foreign bankers, lawyers and advisers charged in a seven-year U.S. crackdown on offshore tax evasion.
“If part of Weil’s defense is that he was unaware what others who worked in that part of the bank were doing, what he and Leichti actually discussed is going to be highly relevant,” said Levy, now at McKool Smith in New York.
UBS, the largest Swiss bank, avoided prosecution in February 2009 by admitting essentially the same conduct of which Weil stands accused. UBS admitted it fostered tax evasion from 2000 to 2007, turned over data on 250 secret accounts to the IRS and agreed to reveal data on another 4,450 accounts. More than 50 UBS clients and four bankers pleaded guilty.
“He contends that a small number of UBS employees who ran and worked in a small division of UBS may have assisted U.S. customers evade their U.S. tax obligations, but he contends that those employees hid their own misconduct,” according to an Aug. 18 filing by his lawyers on how to describe the case to jurors.
If convicted, Weil faces as long as five years in prison.
As in any white-collar case, prosecutors will seek to make matters as black and white as possible, while Weil’s team will probably dwell on the gray areas that may raise doubt in the minds of jurors, according to lawyers not involved in the trial.
Source: bloomberg- Ex-UBS Banker Tax Trial Rides on Underling’s Credibility
