Knowing the guy it's entirely possible that he's lying, but he claimed that he tried seven different british banks and was denied each time.

I haven't found a definitive denial or confirmation of the story, except a few articles where the journalists contacted uk banks and received a "no comment".

I don't dismiss it, since it happens among other occurrences of banking institutions trying to act like a judicial power on their own. Namely the wikileaks donations block, and the surrealistic paypal 'disinformation fee'.

If he genuinely took money from the russian state, or purposedly tanked the pound sterling in order to short it on the forex market (I didn't make that one up), it stands firmly in the realm of criminal behaviour.

So by all means, investigate, jail him, fine him, cut him into pieces and shoot them into the sun for all I care.

But I think banks do this kind of stuff to pretend that they autoregulate, and avoid genuine government oversight.

Allowing this to happen, even to the most unlikeable person in Britain, sets a precedent which makes me uneasy.

Then again I might just be bullshit, what do I know, I couldn't find the info.