A Swiss private banker working for Wegelin & Co, the Swiss private bank, was questioned in the US about attempted money laundering in October 2010, according to media reports.

The client advisor for the firm was “lured into a trap” by the FBI in October of last year in Miami when he was on his way to the Bahamas, a spokesperson reportedly told SonntagsZeitung, the Swiss publication.

He is said to have admitted the attempted laundering to the investigators and was allowed to leave the country at the end of October.

The bank is said to have immediately dismissed him. Wegelin “regretted” the case, said the spokesperson, and the firm is looking into it with the Swiss regulator FINMA.

In 2009 the Swiss bank ceased to operate in the US in response to tougher US regulatory requirements intended in part to curb tax evasion. It based its decision on the stricter oversight of foreign banks and planned changes to estate taxes.