*********************************************************
Five men and a woman, aged 29 to 66, who were convicted of offences including 'Conspiracy to Defraud', 'Conspiracy to Publish a False Statement' and 'Conspiracy to Make False Instruments', were sentenced to imprisonment from four months to twelve years by the Court of First Instance today (December 2).
The court heard that the defendants were senior members of a previously listed company. In 2003, the company had forged personal loan agreements amounting to over $616 million, purportedly showing loans were made to seven close business partners, in order to conceal its problematic accounting ledgers. These falsified ledgers were then submitted to the company auditor and as a result, the company exaggerated its turnover in 2003 as $1.238 billion, of which $337 million turnover was proven to be false, in order to deceive the company shareholders and creditors.
Between March 2004 and May 2005, the company had arranged a number of shell companies as purported suppliers and fraudulently obtained import loans of over $466 million by allegedly making purchases from these fake suppliers. During the same period, the company also inflated its overseas sales and fraudulently obtained export loans of another $224 million in amount. Moreover, some employees of the company stationed in the Mainland were the proprietors of the shell companies and assisted in laundering crime proceeds of over $200 million. The whole scam involved over $1.8 billion fraudulent transactions.
The Commercial Crime Bureau took over the case in 2005. After in-depth investigation, the officers arrested six persons from 2005 to 2007. They were subsequently charged with offences including 'Conspiracy to Defraud', 'Conspiracy to Publish a False Statement' and 'Conspiracy to Make False Instruments'.
Six defendants were convicted and the sentence was handed down today.
Police welcomed the verdict delivered by the High Court. This case is one of the single biggest successful prosecutions on listed company fraud achieved by the Police in recent years. Police will continue to fight against all kinds of fraud cases in order to maintain a clean and fair commercial environment in Hong Kong.
Police Report No. 17
Issued by PPRB
Ends/Thursday, December 2, 2010
Issued at HKT 22:27
NNNN
