Former Riga officials jailed

RIGA - Riga Regional Court on March 11 handed down lengthy jail sentences for the defendants in the so-called Riga City Council bribery affair, reports news agency LETA. Vilnis Strams, the former director of the Riga City Council’s City Development Department, was sentenced to eight years in prison plus confiscation of property. Strams was arrested in the courtroom.

Peteris Strancis, former deputy director of the Riga City Council’s City Development Department, was sentenced to six years in prison plus confiscation of property; he, too, was arrested in the courtroom.
Raimonds Janita, former head of the City Development Department’s bureau, was sentenced to three years in jail, and also arrested in the courtroom. Businesswoman Inara Vilkaste will have to pay a fine in the amount of 200 minimum monthly wages, or 40,000 lats (57,100 euros), the court ruled.

Former Riga and Jurmala Mayor Andrejs Inkulis was fined 24,000 lats, and Estonian citizen Priit Tooming, representative of the company NCC Spilve Development, will also have to pay a fine of 24,000 lats.
Riga Regional Court Prosecutor Maris Leja had demanded one- to nine-year jail sentences for the defendants in the case.

The criminal case deals with a bribe of 1 million euros that Strams and Strancis, via Janita, received from Vilkaste, for changing the status of several land plots so that Vilkaste could sell them at a huge profit; a bribe of 5,000 euros that the two officials, via Janita, received from the company CMR Nami, which required a difficult-to-get construction permit; a bribe of 60,000 euros provided for the Riga City Council officials by Inkulis to get a permit for a new construction project by the company Kvarta; and a bribe of 65,000 euros that Strams and Strancis, again, via Janita, demanded from NCC Spilve Development.

Janita confirmed in his testimony that he had received money from various businesspersons that he later handed over to Strams and Strancis. Strancis categorically denied that what Janita had said was true. Inkulis and Tooming said in their testimonies that it had been Janita who had demanded for them to pay the bribes. It was apparent, however, that Janita had collected the money not for himself, but for someone else, they said, adding that they did not know who that might have been.
Vilkaste did not testify, whereas Strams gave his testimony in writing.

Attorneys for Inkulis and Tooming said that their clients should be acquitted because they were actually the victims of extortion. Vilkaste’s attorneys also claimed that she be acquitted.