VIRGINIA – A Swiss citizen plead guilty today in U.S. District Court to conspiring to help U.S. citizens avoid paying taxes to the IRS by hiding their cash in secret foreign accounts, according to federal authorities.
Andreas Bachmann, 56, of Switzerland would meet with U.S. residents and give them cash that was withdrawn from undeclared bank accounts or he would take cash from them to deposit in these same foreign accounts, authorities said.
Bachmann plead guilty to conspiring to defraud the IRS in connection with this work as a banking and investment adviser for U.S. customers, officials said.
He admitted in his plea agreement that between 1994 and 2006, while working as a relationship manager in Switzerland for a subsidiary of an international bank, he engaged in a wide-ranging conspiracy to aid and assist U.S. customers in evading their income taxes by concealing assets and income in secret Swiss bank accounts.
Bachmann traveled to the United States twice each year to provide banking services and investment advice to his U.S. customers, he said in his plea agreement. According to Bachmann, his executive managers, including the head of the subsidiary’s private bank in Zurich, were aware of his trips and illegal transactions.
He said he was told by the chief executive officer for the subsidiary, “Mr. Bachmann, you know what we expect of you, don’t get caught,” court documents indicate.
Bachmann faces up to five years in prison when he is sentenced in August.
“Today’s plea is just the latest step in our wide-ranging investigations into Swiss banking activities and demonstrates the Department of Justice’s commitment to global enforcement against those that facilitate offshore tax evasion,” said Deputy Attorney General James Cole. “We fully expect additional developments over the course of the coming months.”
Federal Officials said Bachmann understood that a number of his U.S. customers hide cash from the IRS by concealing their ownership and control of foreign financial accounts . They would hold these accounts in the names of nominee tax haven entities, or structures, which were frequently created in the form of foreign partnerships, trusts, corporations or foundations, officials said.
Federal authorities provided an example of one transaction:
- Bachmann received $50,000 in cash from one U.S. customer in New York City and intended to deliver the money to another U.S. client in Southern Florida.
- Airport officials in New York discovered the cash but let Bachmann keep the money after questioning him.
- The client in Florida refused to take the money after the client learned about the questioning by New York airport officials.
- Bachmann returned to Switzerland with the $50,000 in cash in his checked baggage.
- Bachmann advised the executive managers of the subsidiary about the incident with the cash.
Bachmann dealt with Josef Dӧrig, a co-defendant, regarding his business dealings with U.S. customers, among others.
About 1997, the international bank told Dӧrig to form his own company specializing in the formation and management of nominee tax haven entities because it was “too risky” to have Dörig perform that work from inside the international bank.
The international bank then directed the subsidiary and others to do business with Dӧrig and his Swiss trust company, Dӧrig Partner AG.