The Namur Criminal Court ordered the confiscation of €200,000 laundered by an ex-insurer and a restaurant owner on Wednesday. The two men will serve a suspended sentence of three years.
AXA was questioned about suspicious money movements from one of its branches located in Wallonia's Entre-Sambre et Meuse region in 2016 and carried out an audit of the accounts, before alerting the Financial Information Processing Unit (CTIF).
One of the company's insurers allegedly paid €200,000 to the restaurateur to increase his company’s capital in April 2016, which the second defendant returned a few days later in the form of 4,000 €50 notes, which were found in his accomplice’s safe. According to the public prosecutor’s office, this was a way for the hotel and catering operator to launder undeclared sums.
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The insurer was also accused of violating the economic law code by acting as a private lender without declaring it. He allegedly lent money to 14 people who were in urgent need of cash, to the tune of €340,000.
At the end of May, the Namur Public Prosecutor’s office called for the confiscation of €200,000 in potentially laundered money, and fines of €4,000 and €2,000 were sought respectively from the two men. They both also faced a ban on serving as a company manager, but this was not handed down on Wednesday.
