Susannah Nesmith and David Voreacos at Bloomberg/Businessweek have the scoop:
"Former UBS AG (UBSN) client Wolfgang Roessel, accused of failing to report more than $11 million in Swiss accounts to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, will plead guilty and is helping authorities, a prosecutor said. Roessel, 72, was charged April 3 with filing a false tax return and appeared today in federal court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Roessel is scheduled to plead guilty next month and pay a $5.7 million fine, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Kay said. Roessel, who is retired, ran a company that made cameras, and he holds several patents, said his lawyer, Lee Stapleton."
Now it is time to play detective. You see, it seems obvious to the case that Roessel was the person who gave up the goods on Wegelin:
"Roessel deposited foreign proceeds from his business into accounts he held accounts at Wegelin & Co. …"
But now for the money quote…
"…and another Swiss bank not identified in statement today by the U.S. Justice Department."
This is unsettling news for anyone with unreported foreign accounts in Switzerland. There's only one big bank left that is possible and that is Credit Suisse (SNB is the country's centralized bank — it is extremely unlikely SNB). Could that be why the DOJ is keeping this information close? Or it could be one of the smaller private banks, someone like Wegelin.
If you have unreported foreign accounts and aren't sure what actions to take, contact us. We can help. Call us at 888-727-8796 or email info@irsmedic.com.
