Ten years’ jail for banker who aided Venezuela-Malta money laundering scam

The former vice chairman of Swiss bank Julius Baër was sentenced to 10 years in prison yesterday, after pleading guilty for his role in a billion-dollar international scheme to launder funds embezzled from Venezuelan state-owned oil company Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA). 

The scam reached Malta where an investigation is currently underway at the financial management firm Portmann Capital Management, suspected of having hosted clients who were attempting to get the money laundered through Malta. 

Matthias Krull, 44, a German national and Panamanian resident, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, in August, and was yesterday sentenced to serve 120 months in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, and pay a $50,000 (€43,000) and $600,000 (€526,000) forfeiture money judgment.

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As part of his plea, Krull admitted that in his position with the Swiss bank, he attracted private clients, particularly clients from Venezuela, to the bank.  In this role, Krull’s clients included Francisco Convit Guruceaga, who was indicted on money laundering charges on 16 August. 

Krull admitted that the conspiracy began in December 2014 with a currency exchange scheme that was designed to embezzle around $600 million from PDVSA, obtained through bribery and fraud and the conspirators’ efforts to launder a portion of the proceeds of that scheme. 

By May 2015, the conspiracy had doubled in amount to $1.2 billion embezzled from PDVSA. PDVSA is Venezuela’s primary source of income and foreign currency, namely, U.S. Dollars and Euros. 

Krull joined the conspiracy in or around 2016, he admitted, when a co-conspirator contacted him to launder the proceeds of a PDVSA foreign-exchange embezzlement scheme. Krull and members of the money laundering conspiracy used Miami, Florida real estate and sophisticated false-investment schemes to conceal that the $1.2 billion was in fact embezzled from PDVSA. 

Krull also admitted that surrounding and supporting these false-investment laundering schemes are complicit money managers, brokerage firms, banks and real estate investment firms in the United States and elsewhere, operating as a network of professional money launderers.  

Krull’s co-conspirators include former PDVSA officials, professional third-party money launderers and members of the Venezuelan elite, sometimes known as “boliburgués”. 

The investigation was conducted by the United States Homeland Security Investigations and was aided by the National Crime Agency of the United Kingdom, and Italian, Spanish and Maltese law enforcement authorities.