Saturday, Mar 17, 2012
Gulf News
Dubai A female accountant has been accused of fraudulently embezzling around Dh655,000 from an engineering company after forging the owner’s signature and tampering with cheques and receipts.
Prosecutors levelled a long list of 26 charges against the Tunisian woman, M.S., 33, including fraud, embezzlement, swindling, attempt of swindling, forging cheques and payment receipts and using them.
M.S. denied the charges before presiding judge Hamad Abdul Latif Abdul Jawad at the Dubai Court of First Instance, and claimed that the company’s Emirati owner lodged this case against her due to a labour dispute.
Senior Chief Prosecutor Sami Al Shamsi, Head of Bur Dubai Prosecution, sought the toughest punishment applicable against M.S., who was said to have committed her crime between 2009 and 2011.
“I did not commit any of those accusations. When I was taken to the forensic laboratory for testing my signature to be compared with the signatures on the forged documents, I was forced to write a confession. My former boss lodged this complaint maliciously against me because there is a labour dispute between us,” argued M.S. when she defended herself in courtroom seven.
According to the arraignment sheet, prosecutors said the accountant forged the claimant’s signature on several cheques and tampered with the figures written on those cheques such as changing Dh1,000 to Dh41,000; Dh3,500 to Dh35,000 and Dh18,000 to Dh118,000. Then she pocketed the money herself. She was also said to have forged receipts and collected the amounts that were supposed to be salaries, allowances, petty cash for the office and office expenses as well.
The Emirati owner, E.A., testified that the incident happened after M.S. was hired as his company’s general accountant.
“When I asked her to prepare for me an inventory of 2010 she stalled me a lot claiming that she was busy. Then one day a bank’s teller phoned me and asked me whether I signed a cheque of Dh149,800. I told the teller that the cheque in question had the amount of Dh49,800 and not Dh149,800. Immediately I checked with M.S. over the phone… she alleged that it was a mistake. I headed to the bank, and when I saw the cheque I realised that my signature was forged and it was tampered with,” E.A. told prosecutors.
The trial continues.
By Bassam Zaza ?Legal and Court Correspondent
Gulf News 2012. All rights reserved.
