The pre-trial investigation was organized by the Klaipėda District Prosecutor’s Office and carried out by FNTT officers.
The pre-trial investigation was conducted on suspicion that the heads of 6 legal entities, acting separately and with the aim of illegally obtaining funds from the Employment Service and the National Paying Agency, using legal entities established in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, possibly forged documents necessary for the implementation of projects financed by EU and Lithuanian budget funds and carried out chains of fictitious transactions to obtain as much funding as possible from state institutions.
It was established that the persons submitted possibly forged documents of legal entities, according to which the purchase prices of work equipment (high-altitude workers and construction equipment) necessary for project implementation were artificially inflated. As a result, the project values and budgets for implementing these projects were fictitiously increased. To justify the expenses, allegedly fictitious commercial offers for the acquisition of work equipment were produced and used.
Based on applications with possibly false data, 5 contracts were concluded with the Employment Service and one contract with the National Paying Agency for local project implementation. According to the project conditions, the Employment Service and the National Paying Agency compensated part of the project costs in each case, while the remaining part of the funds had to be provided by the project implementer itself.
After project approval, the institutions transferred advances to the legal entities that submitted the applications, and their heads transferred those funds to related companies, thus creating chains of bank transfers. During these transfers, the funds were returned to the original recipient. By repeating the transfers, payments for the purchased equipment were simulated, and these possibly misleading data about alleged mutual settlements were submitted to the Employment Service and the National Paying Agency.
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In cooperation with the Employment Service, FNTT officers managed to seize part of the funds allocated for the local employment initiative project implementation. Currently, a temporary restriction on ownership rights has been applied to these funds.
It is estimated that by acting in this way, the persons and their controlled legal entities could have caused damage to the state exceeding 1 million euros.
The prosecutor of the Criminal Prosecution Division of the Klaipėda District Prosecutor’s Office, Žilvinas Šiurna, who led the pre-trial investigation, drafted a very large indictment of 400 pages and submitted a 62-volume case to the court – 6 natural persons and 6 legal entities will be tried.
The harshest penalty that the court can impose for the legalization of property obtained by criminal means is imprisonment for up to seven years. For fraudulently acquired property of very high value, the harshest penalty is imprisonment for up to eight years. Embezzlement of property is punishable by imprisonment for up to eight years. And for fraudulent financial accounting, the harshest penalty is imprisonment for up to four years.
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