Courtesy of Pam Martens.
1 West Street, Manhattan, Where Thomas Hughes Allegedly Took His Life
Last Thursday, 29-year old Thomas J. Hughes, later described by his brother as “one of the happiest people I know,” allegedly took his life by jumping from a luxury apartment building at 1 West Street in Manhattan. Before any serious investigation had taken place, the New York tabloids had dismissed the matter as a suicide. Hughes was an investment banker on Wall Street.
In any serious investigation, law enforcement is required to look at any potential motive for foul play. But when it comes to serial deaths among Wall Street bankers and technology personnel, occurring repeatedly over the last 18 months in highly unusual circumstances, the deaths are almost instantaneously labeled non-suspicious by the police. But there are two glaring motives for foul-play in almost all of these deaths involving Wall Street or global banks.
First, major Wall Street banks hold hundreds of billions of dollars of life insurance on their workers, and even prior workers, effectively betting that an early death will pay off big for the corporation. The bank collects the death benefit as tax free income, an added perk. In most cases, neither the employee, public nor shareholders know how much life insurance is held on any one individual. The death of a technology vice president could generate a $3 million tax free payment to the Wall Street bank and there is no public acknowledgement and no way to obtain the data.
As of December 31, 2013, the four largest Wall Street banks, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America and Citigroup, held a total of $68.1 billion in Bank-Owned Life Insurance (BOLI) assets according to their financial filings. Since the ratio of life insurance in force to assets can run as high as ten to one, just these four banks alone may hold $681 billion or more in life insurance on their current or past workers.
On March 21 of last year, Wall Street On Parade wrote to the regulator of national banks, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), seeking the following information under the Freedom of Information Act (See OCC Response to Wall Street On Parade’s Request for Banker Death Information).
