Rudolf Elmer Re-Arrested Hours After Appearing in Swiss Court
Rudolf Elmer, dubbed the “Wikileaks banker” was yesterday re-arrested on fresh charges of breaking bank secrecy laws only hours after being found guilty of breaching another bank secrecy law.
Earlier in the day the Zurich District Court had fined Elmer 6,000 Swiss francs ($6050) but he avoided a prison sentence as asked for by the prosecution. He was found guilty of breaching banking secrecy by publishing private client data and also of threatening an employee at Swiss bank Julius Bär, his former employer.
In a statement issued jointly by the Zurich cantonal police and the prosecutor the reason for the arrest was declared as: “The state prosecutor’s office is checking to see whether Rudolf Elmer has violated Swiss banking law by handing the CD over to WikiLeaks”.
The arrest follows the public handing over of two CDs to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in London on Monday. The CDs are said to contain data of about 2,000 bank accounts belonging to wealthy people in business and politics from many countries, including the UK, US and Germany as well as multinational companies which Mr. Elmer said were evading paying taxes, and covers twenty years from 1990. The bank accounts are believed to belong to other banks as well as Julius Bär.
Rudolf Elmer worked for Julius Bär for almost twenty years and was chief operating officer in the Cayman Islands at the time of his dismissal in 2002. In a statement issued by the bank it said: “Disgruntled and frustrated about unfulfilled career aspirations, Mr. Elmer exhibited behaviour that was detrimental and unacceptable for the Bank, which led to termination of the employment relationship. After his demands (including financial compensation) in connection with the dismissal could not be satisfied, Mr. Elmer embarked in 2004 on a personal intimidation campaign and vendetta against Julius Bär”.
After receiving the CDs on Monday Mr. Assange said that previous data from Julius Baer provided by Mr Elmer had shed light on tax evasion, the hiding of proceeds of criminal acts and “the protection of assets of those about to fall out of political favour”.
Mr. Elmer also has his own website. www.swisswhistleblower.com, where two of the missions of the website are quoted as “To challenge Swiss Bank Secrecy at the European Court of Human Rights and the Swiss Courts” and “To show that ethical and moral Private Banking is possible! ”
