"€10M of suspects' assets have been identified" in connection with the €200BN Estonia ML scam

Six former employees of Danske Bank have been charged with money laundering offenses in connection with the bank's long-gone Tallinn branch.

Five men and one woman who are accused are former workers of Danske's Estonian branch's foreign banking division. They were officially charged on Monday.

According to the state prosecutor, it was possible to locate and seize roughly €10 million worth of property, which the indictment claims the defendants acquired through the supply of money laundering services.

State Prosecutor Maria Entsik stated that the indicted foreign client relationship managers at the Estonian branch of Danske Bank "set up their own money laundering business, one which they hid from other structural units within the bank."

Entsik said that it was an instance of expert money laundering.

The six are accused of planning large-scale money laundering at Danske's Estonian branch between 2007 and 2015 while purposefully hiding the true sources of the money that was allegedly transferred to accounts there with a criminal intent.

It is anticipated that over €200 billion worth of potentially illegal funds moved through Danske's Tallinn portals throughout the relevant time frame. 2019 saw the closure of the branch.

Danske Bank was fined €2 billion last year, principally by the US government for its role in permitting the scam.

According to evidence acquired during pre-trial procedures, the defendants reportedly supplied money laundering services worth at least US$1.6 billion and an extra €6 million.

During pre-trial proceedings, State Prosecutor Entsik stated that the Central Criminal Police gathered data linked to several preliminary offences that involved international cooperation.

The indictment made mention of eight prior crimes that were committed in the Russian Federation, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Switzerland, the United States, and Iran.

The charge sheet claims that clients purchased legal entities that concealed real ownership, received advice on how to conceal the electronic trail of transfers from banks, were offered a service to prepare documents for transfers for a fee, and were also permitted to conduct transit transactions between parties A and B but without any actual economic substance in an effort to conceal the owner and source of that money trail.

The Central Criminal Police oversaw the proceedings. The preliminary hearing's time has not yet been determined by the first-tier Harju County Court.

By fLEXI tEAM