Tracing stolen money?

Question

Hello
I have this fear that someday all my hard earned savings will be stolen in a bank robbery. (yes... I'm very well aware that's it improbable) Please just give me the truth, even if it's cold and hard.

- Theoretically if someone where to, say, hold a gun to my head and force me to transfer all of my hard earned money to another account in another state.
- Then force me to close my account.
- Then from the other state the money is transferred to a swiss bank account.
- From there the money is physically withdrawn by the robbers and deposited to another bank account at another bank.
- Then they convert it into bearer bonds in Switzerland economy.
- Then leaps away into the sunset... with my hard earned money.

How on god's green earth would I get my money back?!
The government can trace the accounts in the US, that much I know. But when it departs for Switzerland and withdrawn; can the authorities trace the withdrawned money (the specific $10000 that was withdrawn) or something?????

Answer 1

Well if I wanted to steal 10'000 $ from you it would be a lot easier to force you to withdraw the money directly and to disappear with it. The same result would be achieved with less risk and I would even save a lot of bank and travel expenses.

However the question if the stolen money could be traced is very interesting. So let's try it. To reduce the number of options let's assume there is only one single person who commits the crime without any accomplices

- The U.S. government can trace your money as long as it is in the U.S. as well as the transfer to Switzerland.

- Then the U.S. law enforcement authority would have to request a suspension of the Swiss bank secrecy for your case. As there is a crime involved this would be approved in Switzerland. Now the Swiss bank will be obliged to tell you all the details of the account. As there is no such thing as an anonymous account in Switzerland the identity of the person who committed the crime would be known by now. At this point it might make sense to request the surrender of the criminal to the United States.

- After the money is deposited in cash to another Swiss account the new account can easily be found as the name of the account owner is known. (Remember that the Swiss bank secrecy is still suspended for your case.) It will be also helpful that the origin of cash deposit must be documented by the new bank because of anti-money laundering laws. If the bank suspects that the origin of the money is doubtful they will even refuse the money.

- The conversion into bearer bonds does not make any sense from the criminal point of view. Nothing would be gained. The bearer bonds could be withdrawn in hardcopy but this would create high expenses. It would also be very hard to cash hardcopy bearer bonds. So it would be easier to withdraw the money in cash and disappear. If this happens the trace of your money is lost. Anyway to withdraw the money in cash and disappear would have been an option much earlier in the process. There is no need do all this financial transactions.

Answer 2

No it couldn't really be traced....and the harder thing in this all would be to prove that the money that was withdrawn was yours in the first place.

Answer 3

IF I WERE YOU I WOULD RECORD EVERY SERIAL # OF EVERY BILL!!!! OR I WOULD CONVERT IT TO GOLD!!!!!!