A judge has acquitted 28 people accused of money laundering in an international case known as the Panama Papers, including the co-founder of a law firm that authorities say was at the center of a conspiracy to hide money linked to illegal activities. Jürgen Mossack founded Mossack & Fonseca with then-associate Ramón Fonseca, who died in May. Mossack was acquitted on Friday along with others after a Panamanian judge found that the evidence against Mossack didn't comply with the chain of custody after authorities raided the office of the now-defunct firm, the AP reports.
Prosecutors had accused Mossack, Fonseca, and others of creating offshore companies and using complex transactions to hide money from illegal activities related to the so-called car wash corruption scandal involving Brazilian construction company Odebrecht, which pleaded guilty in US federal court to a charge related to using shell companies to hide millions of dollars in bribes paid worldwide to win public contracts. The judge noted that other evidence in the Panama Papers case "was not sufficient and conclusive to determine the criminal responsibility of the accused." In addition, the judge lifted personal and property precautionary measures against all the defendants, according to a statement.
"We feel satisfied in the midst of mixed emotions, because many lives were affected along the way," Guillermina Mc Donald, who was the defense attorney for Mossack and Fonseca, told the AP. Her firm also represented 80% of the accused firm's collaborators. Judge Balaoisa Marquínez had decided to combine the Panama Papers case with another known as "Operation Car Wash," a major anti-corruption investigation that began in Brazil. On Friday, she ruled that in the car wash case, "it was not possible to determine the entry of money from illicit sources, coming from Brazil, into the Panamanian financial system with the purpose of hiding, concealing, disguising or helping to evade the legal consequences of the preceding crime."
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