|
Deyaar bribes, embezzlement hearings adjourned |
|
|
|
|
Thursday July 30 2009
The Dubai Court of Misdemeanour yesterday adjourned hearings to
September 2 in a trial of nine defendants charged with embezzling some
Dh271 million from realty major Deyaar.
The court wanted to
listen to witness Kamal Finjani and to photocopy the new documents in
his possession. The witness will be also questioned by lawyers who were
not able to do so in yesterday's session.
The nine defendants
are: ZS (American), JK (Indian), SP (Lebanese), JM (Argentine), HS
(Palestinian), GP (Indian), HS (Pakistani), JM (Indian) and NS (Indian).
Except
for JM, all defendants were present in court. ZS and JK are in custody
whereas the others present in court are out on bail.
The case is
an offshoot of two other cases heard by the Dubai Criminal Court. The
first has three defendants, former minister and Deyaar Chairman MK,
former Chief Executive Officer ZS, and an Indian national who is still
at large. The three are being tried for corruption and the embezzlement
of some Dh97.6m from Deyaar.
In the second case, the accused are
UAE businessman AA and SA, a UAE national member of Deyaar's board and
former executive chairman of Dubai Islamic Bank, which owns 45 per cent
of Deyaar. They are charged with accepting bribes.
In
yesterday's session, the court asked witness Mohammed Mustafa whether
there was a work contract between ZS and Tamweel, which he affirmed.
The
witness said around Dh1m had been transferred from the account of the
second defendant, JK, to that of the first defendant ZS. He also said
JK made personal gains since he was a broker receiving commission.
Mustafa
said ZS selected JK to handle the company's advertisement campaigns
because the two were acquaintances since their days working together
for Mashreq Bank. He said he found a number of irregularities in Deyaar
and sent a report to the Public Prosecution, which asked the audit
office to do extra auditing.
Mustafa said he checked the
transactions made by the company's sales agents, including NS, and
found out that they deluded a group of investors into believing that
some of the units belonged to the fourth defendant, JM, so that the
units would be sold at higher than market price by ZS and JK. Their
payback in the deal was a part of the price difference.
Source: Emirates Business 24/7
|
