Judicial verdicts have been pronounced against defendants in several cases of financial and administrative corruption, Saudi Press Agency (SPA) cited an official source at the Control and Anti-corruption Authority (Nazaha) as stating Monday. The first case pertains to alleged crimes of negligence regarding public funds, abuse of administrative powers, accepting bribes, forgery, money laundering and providing a cover-up for the perpetrators of these crimes. As per the details of the case, several executive court employees were accused of breaching their job responsibilities and embezzling public funds that resulted in withdrawal of SR65 million from the court's account at the request of the person who was seeking the court ruling to be carried out. However, the amount was withdrawn even before it was deposited in the court's account by the person who was required to execute the court ruling. Among other charges one was related to receiving a bribe for signing forged cash deposit forms to issue a check in favor of the person seeking the implementation of the court ruling. This was in connivance with a notary public as he issued a letter of attorney in an illegal way to a man representing the person requesting execution of the court verdict. The illegal letter of attorney was intended to be used to cash the check with the help of a local bank employee and with the connivance of several middlemen. On investigating those involved in the crimes and on referring them to the competent court, judicial verdicts were pronounced against them with sentences ranging between jail terms and fines. One of the accused was sentenced to 11 years and 6 months in jail. The total prison terms for the accused are 22 years and 10 months and the fines totaled SR1,025,000, in addition to returning the embezzled amounts. In the second case, two employees of the Riyadh Region Directorate of Health Affairs were accused of asking for a bribe in return for paying government dues to a contractor of a project at King Khalid Hospital in Al-Majma'ah governorate. They were also charged with manipulation of contracts for personal favors, squandering and embezzlement of public funds through payments of maintenance tasks. As per the details, the contract was paid SR23 million when the works accomplished were not worth more than SR6 million. The employees tried to hide and camouflage the way the public funds were paid and spent. They also committed forgery. On investigating those involved and hearing the parties to the case, including the contractor and an employee of a company that reported the crime after discovering it, and on referring those involved to the court, a judicial verdict was issued indicting the Riyadh Region Health Affairs employees. The first employee was handed a seven-and-a-half-year jail sentence plus a fine of SR1,025,000. The second employee was sentenced to six years behind bars and SR1,020,000 fine. In the third case an employee of Riyadh Municipality was accused of receiving a bribe of SR250,000 in return for issuing a qualification license to an engineering consultancy office illegally. On investigating those involved in the case and confronting them with the charges, they were referred to the court, which issued judicial verdicts sentencing both the persons giving the bribe and the recipient to one-year-and-a-half years behind bars plus a fine for each of them. The Authority has stressed that it is continuing to protect public funds and taking to task whoever misuses his position to hinder development projects, investment activities or harm the public interest in any way.
