We are helping a person, as well as a company registered in Panama whose activity is related to investments in financial markets, to recover financial assets totalling approximately half a million euros and financial instruments worth more than one million euros, seized as part of criminal proceedings. The clients’ funds were considered to be potentially related to money laundering activities, due to transactions being flagged as suspicious and unusual.
About the case
The specifics of this case are characterised by the purchase of financial instruments and transactions involving them. Although transactions of this kind may seem confusing to someone unfamiliar with financial instruments used for transfers, some types of business are characterised by these activities.
In this case, Sorainen’s White-Collar Crime practice group represented the clients during both police and court proceedings. The police and the prosecution decided that the clients’ financial assets and instruments might have criminal origins, and consequently they were seized and their confiscation was advocated to the court.
We managed to convince the court of first instance that the seized funds and financial instruments did not originate from a criminal source. We argued that the criminal proceedings, based on alleged acquisition of criminal property, should therefore be terminated.
The court found that the investigator had not proved the criminal origin of the property. The court agreed that that the origin of the seized property was likely to be funds obtained as a result of legal transactions conducted in other jurisdictions. Contrary to what the investigator and the prosecutor had argued, the court agreed with us that the use of technical means (in this case, facsimile signatures) in signing private law contracts does not contradict the regulations of the relevant jurisdictions. The court recognised that, especially if the predicate offense is not known, it is doubtful whether it is possible to prove the criminal origin of the seized property by relying only on the statements of the Financial Intelligence Service and information received from the bank, or by looking for possible errors in the documents submitted by the bank’s clients.
The decision of the court of first instance has not yet entered into force.
Our team
This case is being handled by the head of the Corporate Crime Investigations and Compliance practice group at the Sorainen Latvian office, counsel Dr. iur. Violeta Zeppa-Priedīte; as well as senior associate Agneta Rumpa, and associate Krista Niklase.
