In January 1997, Christoph Meili, a night guard at the Union Bank of Switzerland (precursor of UBS) in Zürich, publicly announced that bank officials were destroying documents about orphaned assets, believed to be the credit balances of both Nazi German and Jewish clients attained during World War II.[1] Soon after, Zurich authorities opened a judicial investigation against Meili for suspected violations of the Swiss laws on banking secrecy.[210] After a US$2.56 billion lawsuit was filed against UBS and other Swiss banks on behalf of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, a settlement was reached that totalled US$1.25 billion in August 1998.[211][212]