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* Graphic on nuclear deal: http://graphics.thomsonreuters.com/15/irannuclear/index.html (Adds comment from the U.S. Treasury Department about OFAClicenses in 15th paragraph)
By Suzanne Barlyn
NEW YORK, July 22 (Reuters) - The Iran nuclear pact couldeventually help thousands of Iranian-Americans who havestruggled with red tape, shuttered accounts, and even criminalprosecution to conduct bank transactions, although relief seemsunlikely anytime soon.
As Washington tightened sanctions on nearly all trade withIran in recent years, international banking transfers that mostAmericans take for granted have become increasingly fraught forthe roughly 500,000 U.S.-based Iranian-Americans.
Iranian-Americans and their families seeking to send andreceive remittances have been hard hit, from students at U.S.universities in need of tuition money from home toIranian-Americans trying to settle estates of deceased parentsin Iran.
"My money is there, but I cannot use it here," said RezaHedayati, a New York radiologist who has not seen a cent of theproceeds from the recent sale of a family home back in Iran.Hedayati, 70, who moved to the United States in 1973, has yet tofigure out how to get the money out of Iran.
The historic deal signed last week by Iran and six majorpowers offers a glimmer of hope for people like Hedayati.
It will eventually lift some restrictions on dealing withseveral major Iranian banks.
The U.S. trade ban still makes direct transfers between U.S.and Iranian banks impossible, but the change could open ways forEuropean or Gulf banks to act as intermediaries for moneytransfers between family members in the United States and Iran.
A carve-out to the U.S. trade ban with Iran allows forfamily remittances, but those funds have to be routed throughthird-country financial entities that deal with Iran.
With a range of non-nuclear U.S. sanctions on Iran stayingin place, major banks remain highly wary of dealing with Iranianinstitutions. The U.S. Treasury Department is not expected torelax its designation of the entire Iranian financial sector asa "primary money laundering concern."
About a dozen mostly European banks, including HSBC HoldingsPlc and BNP Paribas, have paid nearly $14billion in U.S. penalties for sanctions-busting since 2009.
Nonetheless, some foreign financial institutions willeventually want to test the waters, said Eytan J. Fisch, formerassistant policy director for the U.S. Treasury's Office ofForeign Assets Control (OFAC), which oversees the sanctions.
"It will be kind of a slow building process but I do thinkit will happen," said Fisch, now a lawyer for Skadden, Arps,Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP in Washington who advises financialinstitutions.
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Some transactions, such as selling property in Iran, requirea permit from OFAC which also typically authorizes the seller totransfer the proceeds. Lawyers say that the process to get thesale permit can take six months or longer and legal fees can runfrom $2,000 to $12,000.
"A lot of these transactions which are legally possible arelogistically challenging," said Farhad Alavi, a lawyer inWashington who helps Iranian-Americans facilitate remittances toand from Iran.
OFAC issues licenses "on a case-by-case basis consistentwith foreign policy and national security," the TreasuryDepartment said. Timing depends on factors such as theactivities and sanctions involved. OFAC has taken steps tostreamline the process, the Treasury Department said.
Iranian-Americans more often have to turn to unofficialcurrency exchangers in countries such as Turkey or the UnitedArab Emirates to transfer money between Iran and the UnitedStates.
Many of those institutions are also used by money launderersand other criminal networks, raising red flags with bankcompliance officers, U.S. regulators and prosecutors.
Several major U.S. banks contacted by Reuters, includingBank of America Corp, JPMorgan Chase & Co andCitigroup Inc declined to comment on how or whether theyplanned to change their policies on dealing with Iran.
Years of sanctions have snared some Iranian-Americans.
In one prominent case, federal agents in 2010 stormed thehome of Mahmoud Reza Banki, an Iranian immigrant and U.S.citizen working for McKinsey & Co. in New York, after hereceived about $3.4 million from family members in Iran.
He said the money, which he declared on his taxes and usedpartly to purchase a New York apartment, came from his mother'sdivorce settlement.
The 39-year-old was denied bail, convicted of conspiracy toviolate sanctions laws and sentenced to 2-1/2 years in prison.An appeals court overturned the conviction in 2012, but notbefore Banki had served 22 months in jail.
Banki, who still has a criminal record for making falsestatements, told Reuters he shared a maximum security cell witha convicted murderer at one point and is still struggling tofind work.
A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney for the Southern Districtof New York, which prosecuted Banki, declined to comment.
Many Iranian-Americans are hamstrung in less extreme ways.
Some have managed to get money into their U.S. accounts,only to have those accounts unilaterally shuttered by U.S. banksfearful of running afoul of sanction laws, according to theWashington-based National Iranian American Council and otherIranian-Americans.
Ehsan Lorafshar, a 38-year-old anthropologist from Orange,New Jersey, said he came to the United States in 2012 from Iranto pursue a Master's degree in New York.
Two months later, he found out that Bank of America hadfrozen his account, with an $18,000 balance that his family hadlegally transferred to him.
Two near-penniless months later, Bank of America returnedhis money to him, he said, but refused to reopen his account.Bank of America declined to comment on why it froze the account. (Reporting by Suzanne Barlyn; Editing by Charles Levinson andStuart Grudgings)
