PANAMA CITY (AFP) – Thirty-two Panamanians will be prosecuted for alleged involvement in graft revealed by the so-called Panama Papers in 2016, the country’s justice department said on Tuesday (Jan 25).
The 32 defendants will be prosecuted for “the alleged commission of the crime against the economic order, in the form of money laundering, in the case known as ‘Panama Papers,'” according to a statement.
The trial will take place from Nov 15 to Nov 18.
The leak of 11.5 million documents from the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca in April 2016 caused political earthquakes across the world. It named stars, billionaires and banks involved in tax evasion and money laundering.
Iceland’s prime minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson resigned and the fallout also hit Pakistan’s former prime minister Nawaz Sharif.
The whistleblowing International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which revealed the claims, said at least 150 probes were launched in more than 70 countries because of the revelations.
The Panamanian justice department statement did not list any names, but a source close to the case told AFP that among the defendants are Juergen Mossack and Ramon Fonseca Mora, founders of Mossack Fonseca.
