In a further setback for efforts to combat money laundering and financial crime, Jürgen Mossack and Ramón Fonseca Mora, the beneficial owners and directors of the infamous Mossack Fonseca, were acquitted of all charges by a Panama court (Baloísa Marquínez) on 29 June 2024.
The defendants were accused of money laundering by establishing 215,000 shell companies in tax havens, where politicians, celebrities and athletes are said to have concealed their assets. In the spring of 2016, media outlets from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) revealed the transactions of shell companies set up in Panama.
The judge ruled that he chain of custody for evidence taken from the servers was unclear. Furthermore, the other evidence was not sufficient or conclusive.
11.5 million documents were leaked to the media. Almost 400 reporters from over 80 countries participated in the research.
According to the media reports, the “Panama Papers” had shown in detail how criminals, oligarchs and terror financiers had used Mossack Fonseca shell companies “to conduct their criminal business there”. They had also demonstrated “that this law firm not only knew what it was doing, but that the purpose of this law firm was to hide and conceal illegal funds.
Our take on the acquittal
After witnessing Marina Barak’s acquittal in the summer of 2021 and the lenient sentencing of Rudolf Booker and Cheng Liem Li in the Payvision money laundering case, it is clear that judges and prosecutors (in the Netherlands) still struggle to grasp the disastrous effects of money laundering. Consequently, we view the Panama court’s decision as yet another scandalous ruling and a ‘fatal signal’ for the cybercrime enabler industry.
