financier marc rich dies in switzerland

[xchrom]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_SWITZERLAND_OBIT_RICH?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-06-26-06-52-22



FILE - This is a Nov. 27, 2000. file photo of Marc Rich and his wife Gisela as they pose during an award ceremony at the city hall in Zug, central Switzerland. An associate of Marc Rich said Wednesday June 26, 2013, that the trader pardoned by President Clinton has died in Switzerland.(AP Photo/Urs Flueeler, File) NO SALES TV OUT

GENEVA (AP) -- Marc Rich, the trader known as the "King of Commodities" whose controversial 2001 pardon by President Bill Clinton just hours before he left office unleashed a political firestorm of criticism, died on Wednesday. He was 78.

Rich died of a stroke in a hospital in Lucerne, Switzerland, near to his longtime home, according to the Marc Rich Group. His Israel-based spokesman, Avner Azulay, said Rich would be buried in Israel on Thursday.

Rich fled from the United States to Switzerland in 1983 after he was indicted by a U.S. federal grand jury on more than 50 counts of fraud, racketeering, trading with Iran during the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis and evading more than $48 million in income taxes - crimes that could have earned him more than 300 years in prison.

Rich remained on the FBI's Most Wanted List, narrowly escaping capture in Finland, Germany, Britain and Jamaica, until Clinton granted him a pardon on Jan. 20, 2001 - the day he handed over the keys to the White House to George W. Bush.

[Democracyinkind]

1. xpost from other thread

Kind of ironic that he died just when the criminal enterprise he spawned is getting scrutinized.

[xchrom]

2. well placed friends and good timing. nt

[PoliticAverse]

3. BTW It was Eric Holder that recommended Clinton grant the pardon to Rich...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/01/AR2008120102403.html