Fugitive financier Robert Vesco reported dead in Cuba

0 Comments | AFP, May, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — Robert Vesco, the fugitive financier who left a trail of alleged bribery, embezzlement and drug trafficking that reached to the White House, died in Cuba late last year, The New York Times reported Saturday.

Vesco, who fled to Costa Rica in 1971 to avoid a US Securities and Exchange investigation into charges of cheating investors of more than 200 million dollars, died of lung cancer on November 23, the newspaper said, citing people close to him.

But it said US officials, who pursued Vesco for decades across numerous South American and Caribbean countries, were not aware of his death. Cuban officials also did not confirm the death to the paper.

"Records at Colon Cemetery in Havana indicate that a Robert Vesco was buried there on November...