|
Bradley Charles Birkenfeld (born February 26, 1965) is an American banker and whistleblower whose disclosures to the United States government led to a massive fraud investigation against the Swiss bank UBS and other banks that had enabled tax evasion by U.S. taxpayers.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.lawupdates.com/summary/ubs_to_pay_a_total_of_098b_to_settle_sec_and_doj_charges )〕 In February 2009, as a result of the information he gave U.S. authorities, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced it had reached a deferred prosecution agreement with UBS that resulted in a $780 million fine and the release of previously privileged information on American tax evaders.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2009/February/09-tax-136.html )〕 As a result of the financial recoveries facilitated by his whistleblowing, Birkenfeld received a $104 million award from the IRS Whistleblower Office in September 2012. The record-breaking whistleblowing award came less than six weeks after Birkenfeld had been paroled from prison, where he had been incarcerated for abetting tax evasion by one of his clients. Despite prosecutors recommending a lighter sentence due to his ongoing cooperation with federal authorities, in August 2009, Birkenfeld was sentenced to 40 months in prison and fined $30,000.〔 Many advocacy groups from around the world criticized Birkenfeld's prosecution and sentence on the grounds that it would discourage financial industry whistleblowers. Birkenfeld was released from prison to a halfway house in New Hampshire on August 1, 2012 and was released and put on probation on November 29, 2012.〔 The erosion of Switzerland's fabled bank secrecy that began when Switzerland amended its federal banking law in 2009 in the wake of the UBS scandal, a cycle that culminated when Switzerland officially signed the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters on 15 October 2013, began with Birkenfeld's revelations.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.istockanalyst.com/business/news/6608712/switzerland-signs-away-bank-secrecy )〕 Signing the convention, an international tax treaty with nearly 60 signatories that facilitates the exchange of tax data between countries, represents a rollback of Switzerland's status as a tax haven for offshore assets. The Swiss media credit Birkenfeld's act with effecting a sea change in Swiss banking. After Birkenfeld's award, the Swiss newspaper ''Blick'' claimed, “Birkenfeld was a blessing for the Swiss financial industry,” in that his revelations helped accelerate the industry's transition away from its reliance on “dirty” money by dooming the bank secrecy laws that enabled tax evasion. Birkenfeld has compared the Swiss banking industry with gangsters. "In essence, bank secrecy is analogous to criminal racketeering — and the Swiss government, along with every Swiss private banker, is a co-conspirator." Birkenfeld’s key role in as a financial industry whistleblower was recognized by Tax Analysts, a nonprofit organization that provides news and analysis to financial officers and tax accountants, when it declared him its 2009 Person of the Year. Calling him “the Benedict Arnold of the private banking industry”, Tax Analysts said that he “single-handedly” brought about serious changes to the global tax system through his revelations about tax evasion that caused governments to go after tax cheats.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://www.taxanalysts.com/www/features.nsf/Articles/34993C7F875C4A23852576A3005D650C?OpenDocument )〕 ==Early life and education== Birkenfeld was born on February 26, 1965, in Brookline, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston.〔 His father was a neurosurgeon. Birkenfeld attended Thayer Academy, a prep school, and graduated from Norwich University in Vermont in 1988.〔 Many of Birkenfeld's classmates at Norwich, which is the oldest military academy in the United States, typically went into the military upon graduation, but he decided on a career in finance. He obtained a master's degree at the American Graduate School of Business in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bradley Birkenfeld」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|