This Asset Search News Roundup discusses the Secrecy for Sale Project and the indictment of a NY attorney along with a Swiss banker:

I)  The US-based  International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, (“ICIJ”), analyzed more than 2.5 million documents in its Secrecy for Sale Project.  The Project began after the ICIJ received a computer hard drive in the mail, which contained the so-called leaked documents.  The Project’s goal was to uncover money launderers, tax cheats, kleptocrats and anyone else with assets hidden offshore.

The Project detected secret foreign bank accounts or other assets allegedly maintained by individuals ranging from American doctors and dentists to Bayartsogt Sangajav, the deputy speaker of Mongolia’s Parliament.  Among other things, the Project investigated a nominee incorporation service known as the Portcullis TrustNet Group.  According to the Project’s webpages, the overall investigation was carried out through link charts generated by NUIX computer software, data mining and “old fashioned shoe leather reporting“.

II)  Hiding Assets Through Gatekeepers With Accounts Across The Globe highlighted the problem of lawyers, accountants, etc., who orchestrated asset concealment schemes.  One such case may involve New York attorney Edgar Paltzer and Swiss banker Stefan Buck.  A press release asserts that the two supposedly employed Swiss bank accounts as part of a conspiracy to hide millions from the IRS.  They were indicted on April 16th in U.S.A. v. Paltzer, et  al., U.S. District Court, S.D.N.Y., Index No. 13-cr-00282.

Copyright 2013 Fred L. Abrams