Venezuelan Bankers Abroad Aren't Loved But They're Wanted --- They Fled Just Before Caracas Ordered Arrests in Scandal; U.S. Jailing Causes Panic
MIAMI -- Even wealthy, fugitive bankers get the blues.</br></br>"Bankers might be thought to have souls of glass and hearts of stone, but we are human beings," says Gustavo Gomez Lopez in a telephone call from an undisclosed location in Europe. A Venezuelan judge wants to extradite Mr. Gomez Lopez, 44 years old, back to Caracas, where he is wanted on charges of fraud connected to the spectacular failure of Banco Latino, the country's second-largest bank.</br></br>Like most of Banco Latino's directors and top officials, Mr. Gomez Lopez, the bank's former chairman, hurriedly left Venezuela weeks before an arrest warrant was issued for him after the bank's collapse in January 1994. The bank's failure sparked a run on Venezuela's currency that plunged the nation into its worst economic crisis.</br></br>Since then, Mr. Gomez Lopez has been followed abroad by a grab-bag of presidents, top executives and directors from the 17 banks that eventually tanked in the financial panic that followed the government's 83-day closing of Banco Latino. Ultimately, Venezuelan judges issued arrest warrants for 322 bankers and leading businessmen blamed for the debacle that cost the Venezuelan government some $7 billion.</br></br>About half of those facing arrest warrants have scattered into exile of varying degrees of comfort in London, Madrid, and other European capitals, and a good number settled in the U.S. Many are in the Miami area, less than three hours from Caracas by jet and a long-favored playground for Venezuelans.