Four bankers convicted of helping Putin's friend - BBC News

now breaking

news

from Switzerland

four

bankers

who helped a close

friend

of Vladimir Putin move millions of francs through Swiss bank accounts have been found guilty the financiers were accused of

helping

a Russian musician cellist Sergey Rodrugen to launder funds Well, I'm now joined from Record the image of Imogen Fuchs and bring us up to date with what's been happening in court, what's been said, is being delivered right now and we've just heard actually about two minutes before it went on air to tell you that the

four

of the

bankers

who we cannot name, but who are all former employees of the Zurich branch of gas prom Bank, have been found guilty of what is called lack of due diligence, That is to say, they did not know how to properly find out where the money that was being invested in their bank and that in reality many millions came from, was from the person who invested it, was really theirs.

The judge said that it could not have been an apology, it could not have been and The person who was investing was this Russian musician, a cellist Sergey Roll Dugan, not with a big income but, like I said, he had many millions. He was also a close

friend

of Vladimir Putin who is believed to have even been the godfather of the Russian president's daughter, so the implication is that this money could have been related. if not to Vladimir Putin himself to the now sanctioned Russian political establishment and that Sergey Roald Dugan the musician was acting as an alleged straw man for Mr.

Putin or his close associates, for which they were all found guilty with only a seven-month suspended sentence Which was the maximum they could have been sentenced to, it's not really much, but it is a symbol of how Switzerland is really enforcing its laws regarding finances now. I was about to ask you what the fine is for these seven months. It looks pretty small. phrase, a lot of people would think well, I mean, it is and it isn't. I think in a sense their crime was that they didn't think about it enough to ask the questions that bankers are supposed to ask. um, you know, they didn't. knowingly, as far as we know, laundering money, we have to be careful with that, but what they have been accused of is a lack of due diligence, which means they just didn't do it, they didn't check all the boxes, so that it's a kind of maximum sentence, they said in court in their defence, please don't do this, we'll never work again, so the implications are there for them too, it's a seven month suspended sentence, but it's also completely the end of a career, most likely in banking or certainly banking in Switzerland, imagine, thank you very much, Imogen, people there.