Romanian woman on trial in Meilen ZH Domestic worker allegedly blackmailed former CS CEO Thiam
A former domestic worker of ex-Credit Suisse CEO Tidjane Thiam will stand trial in Meilen ZH at the beginning of August. The 43-year-old had blackmailed Thiam by e-mail and demanded over half a million francs from him.
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- The trial against a 43-year-old Romanian woman starts in Meilen ZH in August.
- The domestic worker is alleged to have blackmailed her former boss, Tidjane Thiam, ex-CEO of Credit Suisse.
- According to the indictment, she demanded over half a million francs.
The Romanian woman was employed as a domestic worker in Thiam's villa in Herrliberg. The working relationship obviously did not end harmoniously: the woman was of the opinion that the former Credit Suisse boss still owed her a lot of money.
In the extortionate email that Thiam received in March 2021, the woman demanded 587,000 francs, according to the indictment. She wrote that she "did not want to harm him". She therefore offered to settle their differences and the dispute over alleged "grievances" with this payment.
Otherwise, she would inform the trade unions and the International Olympic Committee, of which Thiam was already a member at the time. However, her plan did not work. Thiam did not pay, but called in the police.
Public prosecutor demands conditional prison sentence
At the beginning of August, the public prosecutor demanded a conditional prison sentence of 7 months and a fine of CHF 1,200 from the Meilen district court. The woman is to be sentenced for attempted coercion and attempted blackmail. The presumption of innocence applies.
Tidjane Thiam, a French-Ivorian dual national, was CEO of the former major bank Credit Suisse from 2015 to 2020, which was taken over by rival UBS in spring 2023.
The villa brought Thiam little luck during this time: his direct neighbor was Iqbal Khan, then Head of Asset Management at CS and therefore Thiam's subordinate. When he moved to UBS, Thiam had detectives shadow his former subordinate.
In February 2020, Thiam resigned as CS CEO after months of spying headlines and moved abroad. He sold the villa in Herrliberg. Thiam currently wants to concentrate on politics. In December 2023, he became chairman of the right-wing liberal Democratic Party of Côte d'Ivoire (PDCI).