VAT fraud case postponed for 17 Sept.

By Lakmal Sooriyagoda

The Colombo High Court yesterday postponed the VAT fraud case, the country’s biggest ever tax fraud case, for 17 September.

When the case came up before High Court Judge Kumuduni Wickremasinghe, the witnesses and accused in the case were directed to appear in Court on 17 September. On that date, witness number six, a Criminal Investigations Department officer, is to testify.

Meanwhile, the Colombo High Court judge allowed a request made by two aggrieved parties, Shirani Anoma Dullewa and Upendra Wettasinghe Dullewa.

Counsel appearing for aggrieved parties informed Court that the money they earned from overseas had been deposited in Treasury Bills with the approval of Central Bank and the relevant documents pertaining to the deposited money were taken into CID custody. Counsel further said the documents belonged to their clients were not relevant with the VAT fraud case and alleged that the CID may have mixed with the VAT case documents. Accordingly, Counsel moved that an ordered be issued to inspect whether his client’s document had been mixed with the VAT case.

Having heard the submissions, the High Court Judge granted permission to inspect the relevant documents to determine whether they had been mixed with the VAT case documents.  In this case 14 accused were indicted on 34 charges including misappropriation of public funds amounting to Rs. 3,996,008,151 belonging to Inland Revenue Department before the Colombo High Court. The offences were said to have been committed between 15 November 2002 and 15 December 2004 along with late Neville Shantha Waththegedara.

The accused are A. Gunasiri de Soyza Jayatillake and Ananda Wickremesinghe Ambepitiya of Inland Revenue and 12 businessmen, Rasheed Mohamed Murshida, Bakeer Mohamed Riyaz, Mohamed Zubair Fawzil Amami, M. Ameer Irshad, N.A. Mohamed Nasmi, Mohamed Kamil Kuthubdeen, Abdul Mohamed Saafi, Sinnaiah Subramaniiyam, Salawudeen Mohamed Ashraff, Mohamed Caseem Shafik, Mohamed Ismail Riswin and Sahabdeen Abdullah were indicted with misappropriation of public funds amounting to Rs. 3.9 billion belonging to the Inland Revenue Department.  The trial is being heard in the absence of eight accused who have left the country.

The case was taken up with A. Gunasiri de Soyza Jayatillake, Ananda Wickremesinghe Ambepitiya, Sinnaiah Subramaniiyam, Saludeen Mohamed Ashraff, Mohamed Ismail Riswin and Sahabdeen Abdullah who were present in court.

 The AG has listed 251 as witnesses.