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The Kaunas Regional Board of the Financial Crimes Investigation Service (FNTT), together with the Kaunas Regional Prosecutor’s Office, is conducting a large-scale pre-trial investigation into large-scale value-added tax (VAT) fraud. and fraudulent accounting in an organized group. .
The crime was revealed in cooperation with the State Tax Inspectorate.
Darius Valkavičius, Chief Prosecutor of the Kaunas Regional Prosecutor’s Office, confirmed that he had asked the court to arrest 4 people on Wednesday.
The 5 detainees were charged with organized group fraud and fraudulent accounting. R. Stton is not going to be arrested, such a decision is related to his role in this story.
“All the suspects played the role assigned to them,” said D. Valcavičius.
The total value of the regulated assets is 2.2 million. A bank account containing 400 thousand euros was also seized. euros. The damage to the state budget will be at least 1.1 million. euros.
Rolandas Urbonas, head of the Kaunas Regional Board of the FNTT, announced that the crime was committed in the autumn and winter months.
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After 30 searches, 5 suspects were arrested, including a possible organizer: a man convicted 13 times of similar financial crimes.
According to the data of the preliminary investigation, in the last 7 months, a group of accomplices is suspected of reducing the VAT on sales and the excise tax that an energy company registered in Lithuania, which markets petroleum products, must pay by more than 1 , 1 million. . EUR, possibly carried out a criminal plan, imitating oil purchase and sale transactions between 5 Lithuanian and foreign companies, which, according to the investigation data, do not carry out any activity.
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Simply put, there was a fictitious oil trade by transferring VAT to fictitious companies, and the overpayment of VAT was used to cover the taxes incurred in the diesel trade.
In Kaunas, Mažeikiai, Klaipėda and Vilnius, 85 officers from FNTT units, the police and the Public Security Service carried out more than 30 searches.
5 suspects have been arrested, including a suspect of a criminal plan organizer who has been known to law enforcement since 1994 for similar financial crimes. According to sources, this may be Mindaugas Žalimas.
After spending more than a year in prisons, the organizer was convicted of large-scale VAT fraud in the trade in fuels, metals, wood, building materials and in recent years crimes were committed in the trade in petroleum products.
The court, when pleading guilty, already declared in 2011 that the commission of similar crimes had already become an integral part of the suspect’s way of life and source of livelihood.
In 2011, he was sued by the Klaipėda City District Court for fraud, falsification of documents, illegal activities of a legal person and an attempt to commit illegal activities; approximately 180 thousand were embezzled through the falsification of VAT invoices. He was sentenced to 11 years and 6 months in prison, sentenced to pay almost 2 million euros. that he misappropriated without paying VAT.
The Court of Appeal commuted the sentence to five years and, in May 2016, the Marijampolė District Court released the man from the prison on probation without having served a sentence of nearly four years.
Currently, the FNTT is conducting three more preliminary investigations for serious crimes against public finances involving this person, with several more cases pending before the courts.
According to R. Urbonas, the organizer loved luxury, he used a 2020 Mercedes-Benz luxury car, the price of which can reach 80-150 thousand. euros. Husband’s wife uses the 2017 “Range Rover” production SUV.
During the raids, several items and documents relevant to the investigation were seized. The investigation limited the assets of companies and individuals to secure a possible civil lawsuit.
Large-scale fraud in an organized group carries the most severe sentences of up to eight years.
R.Stonys is the owner of Kaunas Cogeneration Power Plant (KHPP), previously controlled the Dujotekana company, was one of the largest gas importers of the Russian company Gazprom in Lithuania.
