The former elite contestant claims to have followed orders from her bosses at Credit Suisse, and she has never been a real banker
The Bulgarian, a former employee of the second largest Swiss bank Credit Suisse, justified herself with a career as an athlete, not an economist, during an interrogation in court on Wednesday, Reuters reported. She is accused of helping a criminal group around Evelin Banev-Brendo launder millions of euros from drug trafficking while working at Credit Suisse. The Swiss authorities want about 42.4 million francs in compensation from the bank. Our compatriot told prosecutors that she did not have any qualifications as a financier when she was appointed.
She said that the accusations against her were entirely related to the execution of orders from her superiors.
In Wednesday’s trial, the woman testified that she obtained her position at the financial institution, stressing that she had no education as a banker and that her previous experience in the field was modest. Her identity cannot yet be revealed – such are Swiss laws when a person is charged. For now, they call her by the initials E.
The elite athlete
stopped
your professional
career in 2000
and the following year she was invited to the sports and entertainment industry of UBS for her contacts. There they began to teach her at the elementary level. “I failed two exams and took the basic test for the third time. This was the last opportunity to appear and they gave me the lowest possible result “, says E.
Later, in 2004, he moved to Credit Suisse, where he was looking for people with knowledge of Eastern Europe. There she started in the recruitment department. She herself describes her financial education as “elementary” and admits that she was a newcomer to the position entrusted to her. “Everyone in the bank knew, and it was in my personal file, that I have no education or experience in banking,” said the Bulgarian.
Its responsibilities were mainly related to the promotion of the financial institution. Her training was limited to such skills. She does not remember details of the procedures used by the prosecutor’s office to launder money on a particularly large scale.
Describing her relationship with her clients, she denies that they ever perceived her as a banker: “They had seen me at sports competitions and always perceived me as such. I would look absurd if I introduced myself to them as a real banker. ” When testifying in court, the former employee repeatedly tried to downplay her position and allegations of corruption. However, facts show that it was not such a voiceless letter. It had two increases – one in 2005, the other in 2007, and a sharp increase in its bonuses – from 35,000 francs in 2004 to 184,000 in 2008.
She left Credit Suisse in 2010, but continues to provide financial advice to clients to this day, despite claims that her health has been reduced to 20% due to deteriorating health. She attributes her serious illness to “these 14 years of injustice” alongside the investigation.
The Bulgarian woman is accused of admitting criminal omissions in her judgment when she accepted suitcases and bags full of small used banknotes from her clients, which sometimes exceeded half a million. In this way, over 16 million francs were “laundered” through it. Prosecutors say the former employee helped
disguise transactions
worth more
from 140 million francs
She says she had no doubts about the origin of the cash and explained that this was common practice in Bulgaria at the time because the country’s banking system could not be trusted.
“Most of these issues were resolved at a higher level than mine, I did not participate in their discussion. “Then they informed me about the decisions of the bosses and the guidelines or instructions that I should follow,” she testified.
In the first criminal case against the second largest bank in Switzerland, the Bulgarian denied having committed any illegal activities, and Credit Suisse’s lawyers pleaded not guilty and would defend her at any cost. One of the reasons is that in order to convict a bank, its subordinate must first be convicted.
The indictment covers more than 500 pages and focuses on the connections the financial institution and the then employee had with former Bulgarian wrestler Evelin Banev-Brendo and many of his associates, two of whom are charged in the case. The Swiss prosecutor’s office is focusing specifically on the movement of money allegedly earned from cocaine trafficking between Latin American countries, including Venezuela and Europe.
The Bulgarian was also questioned about one of her clients, believed to be Brendo’s accomplices – his badjanak Konstantin Dishliev, who was shot dead in front of a restaurant in downtown Sofia in 2005. stored in a Swiss bank. E. replied that the topic had been widely discussed, but at a higher level in the bank, and that she had been personally sent to Bulgaria a month after the murder to inspect and document his businesses. “Everything was in place, as declared in the bank,” the woman testified.
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