Swiss AG office orders criminal proceeding against BSI SA bank

KUALA LUMPUR: The Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland (OAG) has opened criminal proceedings against the BSI SA bank.
The decision to open proceedings is based on information revealed by the criminal proceedings in the 1MDB case and on issues raised in the Finma decision of May 23, 2016.
"The OAG suspects deficiencies in the internal organisation of the BSI SA bank. It is believed that due to these deficiencies, the bank was unable to prevent the commission of offences currently under investigation in the criminal proceedings relating to 1MDB," read the statement.
Swiss law (Art. 102 para. 2 of the Swiss Criminal Code, SCC) allows the prosecution of a company that is suspected of not taking all the reasonable organisational measures that are required to prevent third parties from committing offences, and in particular money laundering or corruption offences.
"The criminal proceedings opened on May 23, 2016 against BSI SA are based on information revealed by the criminal proceedings related to 1MDB and on issues raised in the Finma decision of May 23, 2016."
The information suggests that the offences of money laundering (Art. 305bis SCC) and bribery of foreign public officials (Art.322septies SCC) currently under investigation in the context of the 1MDB case could have been prevented had BSI SA been adequately organised.