A Dhaka court on Wednesday deferred the submission of the probe report in the 2016 Bangladesh Bank reserve heist case for the 86th time, setting a new deadline of July 24.
The order came from Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Zakir Hossain after the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) once again failed to submit its investigation report.
The cyber heist, one of the largest of its kind, occurred in February 2016 when unidentified hackers stole $101 million from Bangladesh Bank’s account with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
Of this, $81 million was funneled into four accounts at Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) in the Philippines, while $20 million was sent to a bank in Sri Lanka.
The Sri Lankan transfer failed due to a spelling error by the hackers. Bangladesh later managed to recover around $15 million from the Philippines.
Then deputy director (Accounts and Budgeting) of Bangladesh Bank, Zobayer Bin Huda, filed the case with Motijheel Police Station on March 15, 2016, under the Money Laundering Prevention Act.
Despite multiple deferrals over more than nine years, the case has yet to yield formal charges, raising concerns about the progress and transparency of the investigation.