Eight years since the secret tax lives of thousands of super wealthy individuals, politicians and heads of state were named in the Panama Papers by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, the former partners of the firm, Jurgen Mossack and Ramon Fonseca Mora are back in court in Panama City, facing new charges of money laundering.

The pair have repeatedly denied any wrongdoing when running their firm Mossack Fonseca, which is no longer in business having closed in 2018 shortly after the Panama Papers scandal broke. The two lawyers always denied any knowledge of the way their wealthy clients were using the law firm to register their businesses and hide their tax affairs, or helping them set up offshore accounts.

The Panama Papers involved an enormous treasure trove of 11.5 million leaked files from Mossack Fonseca, detailing their client’s financial affairs.

The ICIJ download included a searchable database of information on 214,000 offshore entities in 21 jurisdictions considered as tax havens from the files held by Mossack Fonseca.

However, this is the second time Mossack and Fonseca have been in court, as Panamanian anti money laundering rules were very lax at the time of the original publication of the Panama Papers in 2016 so they were found not guilty at the first trial.

Panama has since tightened up the country’s anti money laundering rules but the prosecution team of lawyers will have to rely on the legislative framework at the time.

 Mossack told reporters outside the courtroom in Panama that he was ‘very optimistic’ about the outcome of the trial, adding ‘if there is true justice, we will get out of this. Fonseca did not attend the first day of the trial as his lawyer said he was in hospital.

The defendants pleaded not guilty.