2 Indicted in UBS Tax Fraud Case

NEW YORK -- Federal authorities indicted on Tuesday a former UBS banker for his role in a tax evasion scheme that allowed an ultra-wealthy American to use overseas trusts to avoid paying taxes on $200 million in assets, The New York Times reported.

The banker, Bradley Birkenfeld, and a co-conspirator, Mario Staggl, were each charged Tuesday by federal prosecutors in Fort Lauderdale. Fla., with one count of conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service, the paper reported.

The indictment said that Birkenfeld, 43, an American living in Switzerland, and Staggl, 43, who is from Liechtenstein, helped an unidentified property developer hide $200 million in taxable assets from 2001 through 2007, the paper reported.

Staggl worked with a trust entity in Liechtenstein that was part of the evasion, the indictment said. Both defendants worked to create entities, fictitious trusts and bogus corporations to conceal the ownership and control of offshore hidden assets, the indictment said, according to the paper.

-- NYSSCPA.org News Staff

Posted on 5/13/08