Ex-Venezuela bank official avoids prison time in bribery case
Fri Jan 15, 2016 4:47pm EST
Ex-Venezuela bank official avoids prison time in bribery case
NEW YORK | By Nate Raymond and Brendan Pierson
Jan 15 A former official with a Venezuelan state-owned bank on Friday avoided prison time beyond the 16-1/2 months she already served after admitting that she accepted millions of dollars in bribes from a Wall Street brokerage to which she steered business.
Maria de los Angeles Gonzalez de Hernandez, who was a senior official at Caracas-based Banco de Desarrollo Económico y Social de Venezuela, also known as Bandes, was further ordered by U.S. District Judge Denise Cote to forfeit the roughly $5 million she garnered from the scheme.
Cote said she was "affected by the degree of remorse" Gonzalez showed in a statement she read to the court through an interpreter.
"We're enormously grateful for the court's compassion and understanding," said Jane Moscowitz, Gonzalez's attorney, after the sentencing. Gonzalez, 57, was arrested in 2013 as part of a bribery probe involving New York-based Direct Access Partners and Venezuelan state-owned development banks.
More:
http://www.reuters.com/article/venezuela-usa-corruption-idUSL2N14Z1UM?rpc=401
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Maria de los Angeles Gonzalez de Hernandez [/center]