Ramón Fonseca Mora, a 71-year-old man, passed away recently after struggling with poor health. He was involved in a significant legal case related to the Panama Papers, a massive release of secret financial documents in 2016 that revealed how wealthy and influential individuals hid their money.
Last month, Fonseca and nearly 30 others went on trial for various charges connected to the Panama Papers. These documents exposed the ways in which some of the world’s richest people concealed their wealth. Fonseca, along with Jurgen Mossack, co-founded the law firm Mossack Fonseca in Panama, where the leak originated.
Fonseca was specifically accused of money laundering related to the Panama Papers, but he denied these allegations. The leak originated from Mossack Fonseca, and both Fonseca and Mossack were awaiting a verdict in the trial. If found guilty, Fonseca could have faced up to 12 years in prison. However, he was unable to attend the court proceedings in April due to being hospitalized.
In addition to his legal career, Fonseca had served as a minister in the government of Panamanian former President Juan Carlos Varela. He also had a passion for writing and was a novelist.
The Panama Papers, which consisted of 11 million financial documents, implicated numerous politicians, billionaires, and sports figures. They shed light on how tax havens like Panama and the British Virgin Islands were used by the wealthy to hide their assets and evade taxes.
Initially leaked to the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung, the documents were later shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The fallout from the leak led to Mossack Fonseca’s closure in 2018, as the firm cited the financial and reputational harm caused by the release of the documents.
