Kuwait: Prime defendant in key graft case fined KD113m
High-profile case included 24 defendants charged with forgery, money laundering
Cairo: A Kuwaiti appeals court, hearing a high-profile corruption case in the country, has ordered the prime defendant to pay a fine of KD113 million ($364.8 million), Kuwaiti media reported.
Handling the case dubbed in the media as the “The Interior Ministry Hospitality” case, the court also reduced an earlier verdict of 30-year-jail term handed down to the prime defendant, identified as Adel Al Hashash, to 15 years. He was a senior officer at the Interior Ministry.
Twenty-four persons, including officials at the ministries of interior and finance, were charged in the case with forgery, negligence, seizure of public money and money laundering.
The court on Thursday upheld rulings earlier given to some defendants, commuted them for others and abstained from pronouncing penalties for some others.
The court sentenced two defendants in the same case to two years in prison each and ordered them pay a bail of KD20,000 each to stay out of jail and be removed from their posts.
The court, meanwhile, confirmed a 15-year sentence against a businessman and ordered him to pay KD12 million.
The case surfaced in 2016 after a parliamentary budget committee investigated hospitality expenses at the Interior Ministry and revealed the use of fake bills to seize money allegedly spent on fuel, food, hotel accommodation and gifts.