Asset Search & Recovery Basics
Have the methods mentioned at "Asset Search Indicia For Divorce, Debt Collection & Bankruptcy ", been used to hide assets during a financial fraud? Are there any red flags that assets are being wrongly concealed? Finding answers to these questions by gathering financial intelligence during an asset search, can be critically important if you are trying to interdict: marital assets; probate assets; bankruptcy estate assets, business assets; receivership assets, etc.
Assets can in fact, be concealed in schemes as basic as fraudulently conveying a valuable automobile to a friend or family member. This and other simple schemes might be detected by a public records search or by the computer-based research mentioned at "A Low-Cost Asset Search". Via the Internet, some private detectives, data brokers, etc. even offer services commonly referred to as "bank account searches".
Identifying a beneficial owner's hidden assets may still ultimately require far more than just a public records or similar kinds of unsophisticated research. This is true because beneficial owners hiding assets could use a nominee to open bank accounts and purchase property. Furthermore, asset concealment schemes may utilize foreign bank accounts maintained in multiple jurisdictions.
Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff for example, concealed assets by relying on foreign bank secrecy laws and laundering assets between banks in the U.S. and the U.K. Among other things, he is also believed to have hidden a $150 million via a nominee bank account in Gibraltar. Through readily available asset protection services, determined criminals like Mr. Madoff can try to hide their assets in anticipation of a divorce, bankruptcy, or other legal matters.
An August 1, 2006 report on offshore tax haven abuses by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations additionally recognizes that assets could be hidden with the help of "lawyers, brokers, bankers, offshore service providers, and others". Schemes to hide assets however, do not always involve these particular elements. As U.S.A. Today suggested in its February 23, 2007 article, "Corporate owners hide assets, identities", domestic shell companies can especially be formed in states like Nevada, Wyoming, and Delaware, in order to hide assets.
Depending on the circumstances, an asset search might also involve issues related to U.S. privacy or U.S. bank secrecy laws. If assets have been fraudulently hidden, then criminal law violations may have even occurred, as described by "Hiding Assets Via White-Collar Crime". Besides seeking a criminal prosecution in such a situation, one might be able to bring forced collection proceedings to recover the hidden assets and / or gather legally sufficient evidence about them.
Copyright 2007-2010 Fred L. Abrams
