Reserve theft case verdict in favor of Bangladesh Bank: New York court

Reserves of Bangladesh Bank were stolen with the help of Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) of the Philippines. For this reason, the United States New York Court (State Court) ruled in favor of Bangladesh by dismissing the case filed by six accused including RCBC in the case of reserve theft. As a result, there was no hindrance in handling the case filed by Bangladesh to get back the reserve money. But the US has lawsuits against 18 other people or institutions, including RCBC.

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On Monday (January 16), chief financial officer of Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) Masood Astha gave this information. According to BFIU, Bangladesh Bank filed a case against 20 people and organizations including RCBC in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Federal Court) on January 31, 2019, considering that the incident of theft of money from Bangladesh Bank's reserves took place in the United States. Later, 6 people and organizations including RCBC filed a motion to dismiss the Bangladesh case. Later, after various legal proceedings, on March 20, 2020, the Federal Court dismissed the application filed by the various defendants in the Philippines and ordered the case to be handled in the state court instead of the federal court.

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In view of that judgment, on May 27, 2020, Bangladesh Bank again filed a case against 20 individuals and organizations in the Philippines, including RCBC, in the New York Supreme Court (State Court) of the United States of America. After the filing of the case, 6 defendants filed an appeal against the cancellation of the case in this court as well as in the Federal Court. Hearings on the appeal of the defendants were held on July 14 and October 14, 2021.

The New York County Supreme Court on April 8, 2022 acquitted the two companies in a partial judgment in the case. Bangladesh Bank filed an appeal against the verdict, which is awaiting hearing Last January 13 State Court RCBC and other defendants filed an application.

The court clearly stated in its judgment that there was a deliberate conspiracy by RCBC in stealing Bangladesh Bank's money from New York. The court's judgment also mentioned that if RCBC's New York account was not used and if RCBC did not help the accused in the Philippines, there was no opportunity for the money to go elsewhere from the Federal Reserve Bank.

The state court ordered RCBC and the other defendants to respond by February 2 and order mediation. According to the court's direction, Bangladesh Bank's New York-based legal team will review the mediation matter.

The largest incident of reserve theft in the history of Bangladesh took place on the night of February 4, 2016. That night, 8 million 10 million dollars were stolen from Bangladesh Bank's reserves. The money laundered by PC hacking first went to 4 fake accounts of Rizal Bank in Makati City, Philippines. Since then, hackers quickly withdraw this money. In the end, Bangladesh was able to recover only one and a half million dollars with the help of the US intelligence organization FBI. The refund process for the remaining amount lost is pending in the case.