Reza Zarrab, a Turkish-Iranian millionaire gold trader who turned witness in the New York trial of a Turkish banker charged with evading US sanctions on Iran, has been spotted in New York City while leaving an upscale downtown hotel, according to a report by Turkey’s pro-government Hürriyet daily on Wednesday.
Zarrab, who was photographed while dining with a woman in Nobu restaurant in New York last week, left Four Seasons Downtown Hotel on Friday with a Cadillac Escalade. Staying in the hotel under an alias, Zarrab reportedly refused to answer Hürriyet’s questions and sped away with the SUV. He was escorted only by his driver, but not a bodyguard or a law-enforcement officer.
A hotel clerk said the controversial businessman was “probably going to the Hamptons.”
After his arrest in the US, Zarrab had initially pleaded not guilty then flipped, becoming a US government witness. Admitting being involved in the multibillion-dollar gold-for-oil scheme to subvert US economic sanctions against Iran, Zarrab struck a deal with the prosecution for a more lenient sentence.
It was earlier announced that Zarrab was kept in a special section of a New York prison. He became the US prosecution’s star witness in the trial, leaving former Halkbank deputy general manager Mehmet Hakan Atilla as the only defendant in the case. Atilla was convicted by a New York jury on Jan. 3 on five counts of bank fraud and conspiracy. He was sentenced to 32 months in prison.
Turkish state-owned Halkbank had helped launder the proceeds of the complex oil-for-gold scheme that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan had green-lighted and that a Turkish minister had taken millions of dollars in bribes to cover up the plot.
Zarrab was believed to still be in custody while awaiting an expected reduced sentence in return for pleading guilty and providing evidence to incriminate others in the scheme. But a photograph of him taken while he was eating in a New York sushi restaurant showed him apparently at liberty.
The post Iran sanctions-busting Turkish-Iranian gold trader Zarrab spotted this time at New York hotel appeared first on Stockholm Center for Freedom.
from Stockholm Center for Freedom https://stockholmcf.org/iran-sanctions-busting-turkish-iranian-gold-trader-zarrab-spotted-this-time-at-new-york-hotel/
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