Former HSBC Switzerland worker and whistleblower Hervé Falciani has been sentenced to five years in prison for committing economic espionage. However, it is questionable if the French citizen will serve any of the sentence as he remains a fugitive in his native country.
The Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona delivered its verdict on Friday following a trial in absentia. The jail sentence comes in spite of Falciani being acquitted of other offences, including violating trade secrets.
The former IT worker stole details of client accounts held at HSBC’s private bank in Geneva and passed them on to the French authorities. The data, which is believed to contain details of some 106,000 clients, was later passed to other countries by former French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde – the so-called ‘Lagarde list’.
Falciani was questioned by Swiss police, but fled to France in 2008 having been released to visit his family in Geneva. He has since evaded Swiss justice after unsuccessful attempts to extradite him from France and Spain, where he also lived for a short time.
Falciani had at one point indicated he would attend the Bellinzona court hearing, but later said he would remain in France. At a press conference held just before the trial, Falciani said that the trial was “politically motivated”.
HSBC said in a statement that it welcomed the court’s decision.
“HSBC has always maintained that Falciani systematically stole clients’ information in order to sell it for his own personal financial gain,” the statement read. “The court heard that he was not motivated by whistleblowing intentions and that this was not a victimless crime.”
swissinfo.ch
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