Czech Republic: Úsvit EP candidate may resign over alleged credit fraud
Attorney Klářá Samková faces the risk of being removed from the head of the Úsvit (Dawn of Direct Democracy) candidate list prior to the upcoming elections to the European Parliament. "We will consider all options," Jan Zilvar, a member of the party’s executive board, which will make a decision on Friday, told news server iDNES.cz.
Samková is suspected of having aided in the defrauding of the Česká spořitelna bank. "We have asked our lawyers for a statement, Ms Samková has given us some background, and we are collecting information. We will make our decision with a view to what is most advantageous for the Úsvit movement," Zilvar said.
News server iDNES.cz has reported that Samková may ultimately not lead the party’s candidate list, even though ballots have already been printed with her in the number one spot. Party chair Tomio Okamura was still standing up for her as of Tuesday.
"Criminal proceedings have not been brought against her. This is absolutely not a criminal matter. I am a person who does not believe the information published by the media because I myself have been a target of their lies and untruths," Okamura said.
When Úsvit chose Samková to head the candidate list, many of Okamura’s supporters protested against the move on his Facebook profile. "We have a certain potential with the voters, but some of them, 2-3 %, don’t want Ms Samková," an Úsvit functionary said at the time.
Samková is also not being featured in Úsvit’s television advertising as the party’s leading candidate. Now the Radiožurnál radio station has reported that she evidently deceived Česká spořitelna bank when she purchased an outstanding loan the bank made to the Komterm energy holding company.
Allegedly Samková pretended to purchase the bad debt on behalf of her own company. In reality, she was representing Komterm when she bought it for less than its value and used Komterm’s money to do so.
Radiožurnál has acquired internal documents from Samková’s office describing the entire transaction in detail. The documents show how Samková hid the origins of the money she used to buy the bad debt.
The Radiožurnál reporters acquired the documents from a close co-worker of the successful attorney. The person’s identity is known to Radiožurnál, but the radio station has not yet revealed it.
Reporters asked their source whether she would be willing to testify before state authorities about the transaction should police begin investigating once the story was published. "I would be willing to speak about it, but I am being frightened by what is de facto the office of the party. Moreover, when I asked the state authorities, specifically the High State Prosecutor, about this, they said that if I were to discuss a criminal activity of this sort I myself might be sent to prison for violating confidentiality, and no one wants to go to prison today, right?" the source said.
Radiožurnál first researched the data trail on the documents before publishing the story. That information proves the documents really were written in the attorney’s office.
In the documents, Samková and a colleague discuss the course of Samková’s negotiations with bank official Pavel Chalupa on the purchase of the bad debt. Samková did not reveal that she was actually representing Komterm during those negotiations.
"I told him that while I naturally did not have a complete, exact number with me, my instructions were not to exceed 45 % of the value. Once again, I looked very sad. The National Theater lost a great tragedienne. Ing. Chalupa told me he was not permitted to indicate anything, but that he had been ordered not to go below [a certain amount]. Česká spořitelna is aware of all the circumstances, in particular, that while Komterm has made payments on the loan, it has also closed its accounts with them, which means Česká spořitelna has lost any kind of leverage over them. I pretended to not even know Komterm existed…" Samková writes in the document seen by Radiožurnál.
Later on in the document the attorney describes how she will finance the transaction: "We must have it arranged in advance like this: Komterm will finance it through a loan from Raiffeisenbank transferred to their account. They would then like that money to go to the account of Samková, s. r. o., and Samková, s. r. o . will transfer it to a linked account at Česká spořitelna in the name of Samková, s. r. o. that has been opened especially for this transaction. This way the money cannot be seen going from Komterm to Česká spořitelna."
Samková has said she does not want to make any official statements about the transaction because she is bound by confidentiality. The following is from the audio transcript:
Janek Kroupa (Radiožurnál): You had to sign at the bank that you had no connection whatsoever to the debtor.
Klára Samková: Again –
Janek Kroupa: Is that true?
Klára Samková: Again, because this matter is related to my performance of my job as an attorney, I will not be discussing it, not in any way whatsoever.
Ing. Pavel Chalupa has a clear memory of the negotiations with the attorney. "The fact is that when I was negotiating with Ms Samková it really never occurred to me that she was making this purchase on behalf of Komterm," he told the radio station.
Lawyers say this could be fraud
"Generally, it can be said that anyone who uses this tactic to decrease the value of a debt, to reduce its value at a creditor’s expense, is committing either credit fraud or outright fraud," says attorney Václav Vlk. Fraud is specific in that the perpetrator must enrich herself or himself by misleading someone else.
Damages must also result to the person misled, which in this case is the bank. It is up to Česká spořitelna whether and how it will calculate the value of any damage caused.
The saying that all you need is one lawyer for two legal opinions applies in this case as well. Some attorneys contacted for their opinions said this was a case of fraud, while others said it was more a case of unethical behavior.
What is certain is that the bank never suspected that the debtor was actually buying back its bad debt through Samková, which is why experts say this is an evident deception. According to Iva Chaloupková, the Audit Commission of the Czech Bar Association will be addressing any professional misconduct involved.
