Swiss prosecutors are seeking a four-year jail sentence for Trafigura’s former operations chief, Mike Wainwright, as part of a bribery case relating to shipping deals in Angola.
The Financial Times reported that prosecutors are also seeking $156m in compensation and penalties from the charterer and shipowner over what they alleged was a “textbook” conspiracy.
The trial began at Switzerland’s federal criminal court last week, relating to allegations of corruption between 2009 and 2011.
Prosecutors claim that a former chief executive of Sonangol Distribuidora, a distribution subsidiary of oil company Sonangol, is said to have made more than $5m in return for preferential vessel chartering and bunkering deals.
The report cited prosecutor Gregoire Megevand as telling the court that former COO Wainwright was the “linchpin of the scheme”.
Wainwright, who retired this year, “used methods worthy of a seasoned criminal” to disguise his activities, Megevand added in closing arguments.
The prosecution alleges the former executive took delivery of USB sticks in envelopes containing account details about payments from one middleman and tried to ensure data was wiped afterwards.
The intermediary, named only as H, was a former Trafigura staffer who is alleged to have been nicknamed “Mr Non-Compliant” by Trafigura’s former head Claude Dauphin, who died in 2015.
Wainwright and Trafigura’s lawyers deny the allegations and say the prosecution case draws on unreliable testimony.
They noted a failure to bring two executives who allegedly ran the scheme to court for cross-examination.
Compliance measures
Trafigura also argued it had strong compliance mechanisms in place at the time and consequently could not be found to have not adequately tried to prevent corruption.
Closing arguments for the defence will be made on Tuesday.
The case is being brought against Trafigura’s former parent company, Trafigura Beheer.
Wainwright’s lawyer, Daniel Kinzer, said he would be presenting a “robust defence”, according to Reuters.
“He has full confidence the court will find the allegations to be unfounded and will dismiss the case made against him by the prosecution,” Kinzer said.
This will be the first time Switzerland’s top criminal court will rule on a company’s liability for the alleged bribing of a foreign official.(Copyright)
