Credit Suisse is widely speculated to be close to pleading guilty to charges that it facilitated tax evasion for selected American clients.
Pretty heavy stuff indeed.
Truth be told, though, I really think this expected guilty plea by Credit Suisse is more a desired outcome for the DOJ looking for a specific offense rather than a natural progression of an investigation. I mean if that were the case, then the DOJ should have already had a number of guilty pleas and a host of them in the on deck circle.
But, let’s take this expected guilty plea on the part of Credit Suisse to the next step? What does it mean?
Will there be any real teeth to it aside from the payment of the fine itself? If there is little more than a deferred prosecution agreement along with the payment of the fine, then this guilty plea can take its proper place next to the rest of the judicial charades that have played out over the last number of years.
In my opinion, a guilty plea by Credit Suisse should come with a change in management at the very top of the firm, that is, CEO Brady Dougan should be canned. Beyond that, though, I personally believe Dougan should be brought back before Congress to explain how it is that the firm he runs can/might plead guilty in May or June after his Congressional testimony was reported in early March:
The American-born CEO told a U.S. Senate subcommittee on Wednesday that he and other top managers were not aware a small group of Credit Suisse private bankers had helped U.S. customers evade taxes with offshore accounts.
“The evidence showed that some Swiss-based private bankers went to great lengths to disguise their bad conduct from Credit Suisse executive management,” Dougan told the senators.
A small group? Some private bankers? Now we are about to get a guilty plea?
As I asked in March and repeat again, Did Credit Suisse CEO Brady Dougan Commit Perjury? Why is it important that this line of questioning is pursued? Testifying truthfully to Congress is supposed to be not only important but required. Not testifying truthfully — and on its face, one would think Dougan did not — should come with serious implications, i.e an indictment. Not to do so allows for the continued degradation of the rule of law in America.
For Dougan or others to think that “everybody does it” in terms of not testifying truthfully to Congress is unacceptable.
A breakdown in the practice of the rule of law is little more than a stepping stone on the path to a weakened nation and social fabric that defines the US of A circa 2014.