Kazakh Bank Suit Tied to Trump Soho May Turn on Emails

The son of a former Kazakh politician accused of embezzling state assets used hundreds of accounts for encrypted emails to hide talks about real-estate dealings in the U.S. while facing a money-laundering suit involving a purchase of condos in the luxury Trump Soho tower, according to a bank seeking to recover billions of dollars it claims were stolen.

Ilyas Khrapunov, who’s living in Switzerland to avoid arrest in Kazakhstan, also ignored U.S. court rules requiring the preservation of evidence when litigation is looming by deleting accounts and failing to produce documents about his real-estate deals, Kazakhstan’s BTA Bank JSC told the Manhattan federal court on Tuesday. The bank also claims he hid the location of a key witness in the case, who was eventually located in California and deposed.