Businessman fighting extradition claims Chilean President carrying out ‘financial genocide’

Chilean 'Madoff' claims Chilean president, a victim of the Pinochet regime, is carrying out a 'financial genocide' against opponents

Alberto Chang Rajii is wanted in Chile facing investment fraud
Alberto Chang Rajii is wanted in Chile facing investment fraud

Chilean businessman Alberto Chang-Rajii has accused his country's President of carrying out “financial genocide” against high net worth individuals in Chile.

Chang Rajii returned to the dock this afternoon to be cross-examined in proceedings over a request for his extradition to Chile, where he is wanted to face charges of investment fraud. 

He is insisting that the request is politically motivated.

“Behind all this there is of course political interest. Our president Michelle Bachelet was a victim of [dictator Augustp] Pinochet and had fled to Soviet Germany. She raised her children there before returning to Chile. Her son and his wife had gone to the Banco de Chile to request a loan just because they were the children of the president. The owner of the Bank was placed under so much pressure that he accepted.”

“2015 exploded with a lot of documents that exposed the bribes given 20 years before. Just as Pinochet committed genocide against his dissidents, president Bachelet is carrying out a financial genocide against her opponents,” Chang Rajii said.

“Today the same people who are investigating me are also investigating the leader of the opposition on the same charges. This same prosecutor who is after me is after one of the possible future presidents of Chile,” Chang Rajii said, as he replied to questions made by prosecuting lawyer Vincienne Vella from the Office of the Attorney General.

Chang Rajii repeated allegations he had made about what he called his "malicious prosecution" at the hands of the Chilean public prosecutor.  

“The public prosecutor has his own agenda and they answer only to themselves. Nobody controls them. The judges and grand jury have no control and have given them free reign to arrest anyone on verbal orders without any proof,” he alleged. 

Vella confronted him with the fact that his Constitutional case on this issue had been rejected.

“What this meant was that everyone within the legal profession were afraid of the public prosecutor,” he said.

He reminded the court that his own lawyers had been warned by the Chilean authorities that they would be charged with money laundering if they accepted payment for defending him.

Chang's Grupo Arcano had promised investors up to 1.5 percent a month for an investment of 200 million pesos ($300,000), according to a contract seen by Bloomberg, but none of the investors in the group’s eight-year-old fund – which offered some clients guaranteed returns of as much as 36 percent a year – had received either their money or the promised returns when they fell due.

Arcano Group CEO Jorge Hurtado had quit his post in April, claiming the company to have been a pyramid scheme that paid off old investors using new investor's money. 

Vella prodded Chang Rajii on this, pointing out that victims of Onyx Capital , the investment arm of Chang Rajii's company Grupo Arcaono, had claimed that he had shown them documents indicating that he had millions of dollars which turned out to be false. How could he explain this, she asked.

“The documents which say I had millions of dollars was released by my executives,” who, he said, had been under enormous pressure from the authorities.

“The prosecution was so malicious that it infiltrated my email account and sent emails saying that we had no money and even that I was going to kill myself.” The SEC had established his solvency, he said.

“Believe me, the offence carried a jail sentence and had been dropped.”

He denied using company money for his personal spending. Banco de Chile only held company profits for tax purposes. Other banks held the capital, he explained.

Magistrate Aaron Bugeja observed that from the testimony submitted so far he understood that the SEC proceedings had been settled.

Chang insisted on testifying, despite warnings from the court that he would be charged with perjury if any of his assertions were not found to be true.

The Chilean told the court that earlier today his lawyers in the USA had reached a settlement with the SEC, which in turn, had declared that the worldwide asset freeze to which he was subject was unnecessary. But if the Chilean prosecutor continues in his refusal to acknowledge this document, his companies would remain unable to pay their creditors, he said.

Vella took issue with his claim that he would not be given a fair trial were he to be returned to Chile. Supreme Court Judge Carlos Gajardos Galdabez had admitted to being “emotionally involved,” Chang said, but had continued to hear the case.

“When you have a process like this when you have the judge who in any other court would have recused himself, the charges which are not in dubio pro reo...the courts in 3 instances dismissed our claims. When a system is malicious, no matter how many times you make your claim it will not be upheld. Judge Gajardos Galdabez should not have taken part.”

“What had the supreme court said?” asked Vella, pointedly.

The same court to which the justice had declared that he had a personal interest in the case had found that he did not have a personal interest, claimed Chang Rajii.

27 pages of constitutional breaches had been raised by his lawyer, who he reminded the court, had written the code: “They were all dismissed. When the supreme court dismissed them -that is when I decided to seek justice from another court of justice in the world.”

Vella asked about claims he made on Friday, that his employees had testified under duress. Despite the fact that they could retract their testimony, none of them had, she pointed out.

Chang Rajii replied that while this was true, some of them had changed their versions to the complete opposite.

“After the events which took place in March, they started changing their declarations. Last week the IRS said that many of my executives had committed securities and bank crimes. Nothing of what they said can be considered in these proceedings because they are also accused of other crimes - their testimony is inadmissible.”

The case continues.

Lawyer Vincienne Vella is representing the Attorney General, while lawyer Stefano Filletti is appearing for Chang Rajii in the proceedings.