Ansbacher applies to breach Cayman secrecy law

An application by Ansbacher Cayman for permission to give information to the Irish High Court inspectors investigating the Ansbacher deposits opened yesterday in the Cayman courts with legal representatives of six parties present.

Three separate objectors are represented in the case which also involves the Attorney General of the Cayman Islands, the Irish inspectors and Ansbacher banks itself. It is expected the case, which is being heard in front of camera, will last for three or possibly four days and that judgment will be reserved.

Ansbacher bank is seeking permission under the Confidential Relations (Preservation) Law (1995) to divulge information to the inspectors. The law governs the conditions under which Cayman laws on commercial secrecy can be breached and the case is viewed on the islands as an important one.

The inspectors believe the bank still has important information concerning the activities of the bank in the Republic during a 20-year period, between 1974 and 1994, when the late Mr Des Traynor was supplying financial services to some of the most wealthy business figures in Ireland.

The inspectors believe some of these figures were hiding undeclared income in the Ansbacher deposits. The objectors to the Ansbacher application are known to include two Cayman companies, Hamilton Ross Company Ltd and Poinciarna Fund Ltd, both of which are fund or trust management companies which at one stage formed part of the Ansbacher deposits.

The companies were run by the late Cayman Islands banker Mr John Furze and up to the mid-1990s were run by Ansbacher Cayman. Funds managed by the company are known to include those belonging to Mr Charles Haughey, the Fianna Fail TD Mr Denis Foley, and two Irish figures involved in the running of the Ansbacher deposits, Mr Padraig Collery and Ms Joan Williams.

A third objector is also to make an application to the courts and is believed to be a client or former client of Ansbacher Cayman.

The case opened yesterday with an outline by Ansbacher Cayman as to why it should be allowed to divulge information to the inspectors. One of the Irish inspectors, Mr Michael Cush SC, is in the Cayman Islands for the hearing. The inspectors are being represented by London-based Mr Tony Bueno QC and Mr Hector Robinson, solicitor, of Quin & Hampson, a local firm of solicitors which acted for the McCracken Tribunal in 1997.