ERVA has received a summary of the interrogation of the Danske Bank staff members from an undisclosed source.
Morten Runo Waaben said that he was just the investor and came into the bank in 2006, at a later stage.
Acting lawyers were not too keen on his side of the story because he was merely the investment manager, and was not involved in the signing up of the claimant. However, his version of how the investment was conducted grossly differs from the truth; he stated that it was Euan Armstrong who instructed how the spread of the investments should be allocated and that in fact, against his own advice, Euan wanted a higher risk approach.
Morten also said that he was aware that Euan was an ‘avid’ investor, with substantial experience.
Henrik Hjerrild Hansen went on to deny any involvement in the sale stating that although he had signing the product at the Notary Public, it was all done via Luxembourg. When lawyers confronted him on his knowledge of what he was really signing at the Notary Office, he said he was aware it was a mortgage loan but little else.
In respect of his involvement with the Danske Office in Spain, he said that his role was merely that of general information to the public about the bank and its services, without providing advice. This is hardly consistent with the their own publicity:
When lawyers asked him about Spanish tax matters, he said he had little clue about this as that was not his role or remit, and again referred the matter to Luxembourg. Lawyers strongly confronted this statement appealing to his own LinkedIn profile, which he has now removed, where he seems ‘the’ expert in Private Banking with Danske, after 40 years of service for this entity.
Finally, the lawyer for the bank, Ole Stenersen, was quite a funny chap although could not help stop lying. In his words, he was no tax expert and could not answer anything about the Capital Assurance Product. He denied knowledge of this set up and referred it to ‘someone else’ within bank. Surprisingly, when his counsel starting asking questions about this same matter, he suddenly had the answers in respect to whether a mortgage loan for tax purposes refers not to the mortgage itself, but to the loan and how it gets invested.
He also gave inconsistent answers about the KPMG letter citing just one paragraph of it whilst, barefacedly, denied the other (one where KPMG states that they never authorized the tax benefits of the product).
ERVA is now hoping that other victims of these thieves will wish to join the case; in connection to this.
It is our determination to impede Danske Bank get away with this and we are truly hoping that this matter will go to trial.
We will not finish this post without mentioning a new participant soon to be exposed, Mr. Soren Glente.
