Czech fugitive businessman Krejcir facing another criminal charge

On Monday, the supervising state attorney received the proposal to file the criminal lawsuit and now she is studying the file, Irena Valova, spokeswoman for the High State Attorney's Office (VSZ) in Prague, told CTK today.

According to available information, the case is connected with the alleged customs fraud of three billion crowns afflicting Cepro, a strategic state-owned company that operates petrol stations, and transports and stores oil products.

Krejcir was head of a criminal conspiracy in the case of the customs debt, Valova said.

Krejcir is probably also facing charges of preparing the murder of a customs officer.

The police and the VSZ have refused to elaborate on the legal qualification of the act and its substance.

"At the beginning of the week, we passed the file to the VSZ in Prague with a proposal to lodge a criminal complaint against 11 persons," anti-corruption police spokesman Jaroslav Ibehej has told CTK.

The file has 15,000 pages, Ibehej said.

According to the state attorneys, Krejcir was one of the masterminds of a customs evasion worth half a billion crowns through petrol deals of the company M5 due to which he was arrested and taken into custody for the first time in 2002.

Krejcir was allegedly also involved in the embezzlement of money from the firm Technology Leasing.

Courts are dealing with both cases.

A Prague appeals court is now deciding on the case of Technology Leasing.

In January 2011, the Prague City Court imposed an eight-year cumulative prison sentence on Krejcir for a loan fraud stripping the Technology Leasing of more than 150 million crowns.

Krejcir was previously convicted over tax delicts and a fraud with shares of the Teplarny Otrokovice heating plant.

Krejcir, who is wanted for property and violent crimes in the Czech Republic, escaped from the Czech police during a home home search in June 2005. Since April 2007 he has stayed in South Africa where he arrived using a fake passport.

In February 2008, a court in Johannesburg decided that Krejcir would not be extradited to the Czech Republic for prosecution.

In South Africa, Krejcir is being investigated over a number of criminal charges, including murder.

($1=19.800 crowns)

Author: ČTK
www.ctk.cz