Swiss banking giant UBS appeared before a federal judge in Brooklyn Tuesday, seeking protection from potential Holocaust-related lawsuits stemming from newly discovered Nazi connections at Credit Suisse, the bank it acquired last year.
UBS attorney David Burns requested that U.S. District Judge Edward Korman issue a “clarifying order” confirming that a massive $1.25 billion settlement from 1999 encompasses “all claims, past, present and future” connected to the Holocaust, World War Two, and related events.
The 1999 agreement resulted in payments to more than 458,000 Holocaust survivors and their families through Credit Suisse, according to legal documents. UBS purchased Credit Suisse in a Swiss government-orchestrated bailout during 2023.
The current legal dispute emerged after a 2020 investigation into Credit Suisse revealed fresh evidence of the bank’s Nazi connections, including 890 accounts potentially linked to Nazi organizations. Judge Korman has not announced when he will make his decision.
During the lengthy 2-hour and 15-minute hearing, Burns argued that the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a prominent Jewish human rights organization, should be barred from challenging the existing settlement, stirring up public debate about it, or pursuing fresh legal action based on newly surfaced information regarding Credit Suisse’s Nazi relationships.
“The Wiesenthal Center has from the outset made the very public and private claim that Nazi assets are not part of the settlement, and has threatened litigation,” Burns stated. He emphasized that UBS sought “complete closure.”
However, Faith Gay, representing the Wiesenthal Center that had previously supported the 1999 agreement, pushed back against UBS’s request for what she characterized as an advisory ruling that “expands and reinterprets” the settlement by dismissing claims “as broad as the Grand Canyon.” Gay maintained her client has made no litigation threats.
“There’s nothing for you to decide,” Gay informed the judge who had originally supervised the settlement. “And yet they’ve given us this proposed order that binds all parties.”
Gay further alleged that UBS was attempting to suppress her client’s constitutional right to free speech by silencing criticism of the settlement’s validity, comparing it to “putting a sock in Simon Wiesenthal’s mouth.”
Part of the disagreement centers on UBS’s refusal to provide approximately 150 documents requested by investigator Neil Barofsky, which the bank claims fall under attorney-client privilege protection.
UBS has already provided 16.5 million documents to Barofsky and indicated willingness to release the contested materials if Korman grants the requested clarifying order.
Barofsky’s investigation is scheduled for completion this year.
Judge Korman noted that Nazi assets were not discussed during the original 1999 settlement talks, as he recalled. He urged both legal teams to negotiate over which documents could be released.
The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee recently examined details from Barofsky’s investigation during hearings last month.
Committee Chairman Senator Charles Grassley, a Republican, revealed to reporters that the 890 questionable accounts belonged to entities including the German Foreign Office, which coordinated Jewish deportations to concentration camps, along with the SS paramilitary force and a German weapons manufacturer.
Both UBS and Credit Suisse have issued public apologies for their involvement in Holocaust-era activities.
