Silves public workers accused of fraud and forgery after buying cars with social funds

Two former public officials who worked at the IPSS Centro Social Espaço Aberto, in Pera, in the municipality of Silves, have been formally accused by the Public Ministry of fraud, abuse of trust, falsification of documents, computer forgery and corruption. The defendants are the ex-president of the board and a director of services, arrested in 2017 by the Judiciary Police (PJ) on suspicion of having harmed the institution by robbing it of around 95 thousand euros.

According to the accusations, released this Wednesday by the Public Ministry (MP), "between January 2012 and June 2016, the defendants removed several tens of thousands of euros from the social centre that they spent for their own benefit" and, "with the institution's money, they will also have purchased consumer goods for themselves, namely household appliances".

Moreover, "one of the defendants entered passwords and user names of her friends on the online portal of the Tax Authority and, without their knowledge, issued fictitious receipt invoices in her name". The objective would be "that the accounting of the social centre does not reflect the disappearance of funds that had been withdrawn". The scheme was discovered in 2017 after a complaint reached the Judicial Police’s Criminal Investigation Department in Portimão.

The defendants no long work at IPSS, which, at the time, was made up of a nursery for children up to 4 years old, ATL, and a social canteen that supported around 100 locals living on social security and private support.

The complaint was made by the administration of the facility in 2016, after a meeting was convened due to complaints from parents regarding the "lack of security" offered by the institution, lack of dialogue and constant absence of those responsible for the centre, especially the president. At the time, press found that the new administrators of the IPSS detected several irregularities, such as car purchases which the IPSS had paid for, but which were still in the possession of the former public officials. They also were not able to find inventories of some goods, and realized the existence of dozens of invoices for goods and services charged had not been provided.

The investigation showed that the defendants each bought a car on behalf of IPSS, enjoying tax benefits, but the vehicles were used for personal use. They did the same with mobile phones and computers.

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