AN appeals court in Bahrain has increased the fines imposed on three officials and four banks in connection with a money laundering case.
The Iranian men and the four Iranian state-owned banks – Future Bank, Bank Saderat, Bank Melli and Bank Saderat, Doha – are all facing charges in five money laundering cases worth billions of dollars in a Bahrain-based bank.
On April 1, the High Criminal Court jailed the men for 25 years each in one of the cases.
They were also each fined BD500,000, and BD40,000 was confiscated from them.
The banks were fined BD500,000 each – for a total of BD2 million.
However, prosecutors lodged an appeal at the Supreme Appeals Court which yesterday increased the fines from BD500,000 to BD1 million for each of the men and banks.
With yesterday’s ruling, the accused now have to pay a combined fine of BD35 million – BD15 million for the men and BD20 million for the banks.
“The jail sentences have been upheld but the fined have been changed to BD1 million each,” read the ruling.
The GDN reported on July 17 that the High Criminal Court sentenced the three officials of Future Bank to five years in jail and fined each BD1 million.
The court also fined Future Bank and three other banks BD14m and ordered the confiscation of the illegal transfer amounts that reached BD500,000.
According to the case documents, the Public Prosecution discovered an Iranian plot involving several entities, including some sanctioned internationally for funding terrorism, to carry out financial transaction while evading scrutiny.
The GDN reported in the same month that each of the three bank officials was sentenced to 25 years in prison for a series of crimes, including money laundering and distributing funds through illegal means in Bahrain.
Laundering
The defendants, who are still at large, were senior officials at Future Bank, which was closed down in Bahrain in 2016 for laundering a combined $7.4 billion and issuing trade finance guarantees worth $1.5bn.
The men have been implicated in five separate cases connected to money laundering, with the High Criminal Court imposing a BD5m fine on each individual in addition to a combined BD21m fine against the four Iranian state-owned banks.
The court also ordered the confiscation of a total of BD1.5m from Future Bank, Bank Saderat, Bank Melli and Bank Saderat (Doha branch).
The latest charges were filed after the completion of 20 cases into the operations of Future Bank, which was controlled by Bank Saderat and Bank Melli. A 2018 assessment of Future Bank’s operations by the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) found it and its controlling shareholders had engaged in systematic and widescale violations of Bahrain’s banking laws.
Subsequent interviews with Future Bank employees and a review of tens of thousands of Future Bank documents were undertaken by the CBB, the Interior Ministry’s financial investigation unit, and independent international regulatory experts and forensic analysts.
The GDN reported in April 2018 that Interior Minister General Shaikh Rashid bin Abdulla Al Khalifa said that Future Bank had to be placed under administration in 2015 for violating banking laws.
He said investigations had revealed that the bank was involved in laundering $4.7bn through ‘wire stripping’ SWIFT messages, laundering $2.7bn through an old method of inter-bank messaging, issuing letters of credit and trade finance guarantees worth $1.5bn, and disbursing funds through illegal means in Bahrain to strengthen Iranian influence in the country.
noorz@gdn.com.bh
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