Legal
Jury In US Clears Former High-Ranking UBS Banker On Tax Charges

Raoul Weil, who once ran UBS AG’s global wealth-management business, was acquitted by a Florida jury of a charge that he conspired to help US clients cheat their taxes.
Raoul Weil, who once ran UBS’s global wealth-management business,
has been cleared by a Florida jury of a charge that he conspired
to help US clients cheat on their taxes.
The jury found that Weil, who agreed to be extradited in 2013,
had not been guilty of helping customers hide $20 billion in
offshore accounts.
Media reports said the jury took only one hour and 15 minutes to
reach its verdict after a three-week trial ended abruptly
yesterday, when the defence declined to call any witnesses,
asserting that the prosecution had failed to make its case.
UBS declined to comment to WealthBriefing on the
matter.
“The jury sent a strong message to the government,” said Matthew
Menchel, Weil’s lawyer. “This case should never have been
brought,” he was quoted by the Financial Times as
saying.
Weil, 54, reportedly at one time the third most senior banker at
UBS, was declared a
fugitive from US justice in 2009. However he worked openly as
chief executive of an independent Swiss asset management
business. He was arrested in Italy during a holiday in that
country last year.
UBS in 2009 settled criminal and civil charges in the US of
aiding wealthy Americans to evade tax and Swiss authorities
permitted thousands of client account details to be passed to the
US in what was seen at the time as a historic breach of Swiss
bank secrecy. Last August, the countries signed a pact under
which Swiss banks have the option of saying if they suspect they
might be at risk of having violated US laws.