U.S. authorities have accused Stanford of masterminding a $7 billion Ponzi scheme centered on fraudulent certificates of deposits through his Stanford Group Co. In June, Stanford was indicted for mail, wire and securities fraud and he remains in jail awaiting trial.
The government asked the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas in Dallas to let it serve a so-called “John Doe summons” on Ralph Janvey, the court-appointed receiver for Stanford and related entities.
Prosecutors used the same kind of summons to go after giant Swiss bank UBS AG and win eventual access to the names of 4,450 U.S. clients.
The Obama administration has aggressively sought to crack down on Americans hiding assets overseas from the Internal Revenue Service.
George Clarke, a white collar tax attorney in Washington D.C., said the Justice Department request was another step in the government’s effort to eradicate opportunities for U.S. taxpayers to hide assets offshore.
“It should be a wake-up call for folks who thought that the enforcement action against UBS would be a one-hit wonder,” he said.
