It is a win for the cadre of staff which helped Swiss banks, lawyers, accountants and others to deal with alleged tax dodgers and cheats: the Federal Court has prevented data on the third parties from being passed on to U.S. officials, according to agency reports.

The case was brought by an unnamed American expat living in Switzerland. The person objected to having details known to the bank handed over to foreign prosecutors, the latest chapter in a long-running saga over sending data on clients to U.S. officials.

After client data, the U.S. had also sought related materials from banks to illustrate a pattern, find connections between financial firms, and figure out where the cheats had taken their money to elude detection.

Shielding Staff

The court ruled that third-party contacts and details aren't relevant, and that Swiss tax officials hadn't sufficiently proven that side information is vital to building a case against a tax cheat. The ruling also sought to moderate sending documents willy-nilly, in order to avoid sending data that could implicate someone not involved in the wrong-doing.

The court went even further in its protection of bank employees and others involved in helping tax dodgers: if third parties were involved in crime, officials would need to pursue prosecution, and not mere administrative assistance, to get at their names and details.

The decision backs a lower-court ruling and reinforces the standing of bank employees and a host of other staff who weren't necessarily the linchpin of tax cheating.