Sentenced to 6 Months Imprisonment for Embezzlement
Court: "Denies Crime, No Effort to Compensate Victims"
A man in his 60s who managed apartment maintenance fee expenditures and withdrew and spent more money than his allocated salary was sentenced to prison.
On the 16th, Judge Park Seong-min of the Chuncheon District Court Criminal Division 3 sentenced A (69) to six months in prison on charges of embezzlement in the course of duty.
A maintenance fee notice is delivered to a mailbox in an apartment in Seoul. This is a stock photo unrelated to the article. Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@
A was in charge of managing maintenance fee expenditures at an apartment self-management committee in Hongcheon-gun from February 2018 to July 2022. During this period, he was prosecuted for withdrawing and spending more money than his allocated salary and embezzling a total of about 30 million won under the pretext of stair cleaning fees and other expenses.
The indictment also included the fact that during the same period, A received simplified receipts for suppliers from acquaintances running businesses, created false receipts, and withdrew about 7 million won from accounts claiming to cover those costs.
A claimed innocence, stating, "I received my salary legitimately according to regulations," and "Some amounts were omitted from receipts by mistake, and I never created false receipts," but this was not accepted.
Judge Park stated, "The defendant denied the crime and made no effort to recover the embezzlement damage amounting to about 38 million won," and sentenced him to prison.
However, since there was no concern about evidence destruction or flight risk, A, who had been tried without detention, was not taken into custody in court.
Meanwhile, in January, a bookkeeping staff member who embezzled 120 million won in maintenance fees over 454 instances from January 2017 to May 2020 was sentenced to one year and six months in prison.
The bookkeeping staff embezzled money by attaching receipts as if purchasing necessary items with their own credit card, then canceling the card payment or buying cheaper items after cancellation. It was also investigated that during a similar period, tax receipts were forged to obtain approval for maintenance fee withdrawals from the management office manager and others.
The court stated, "Although this is a first offense, the embezzlement period was long and the amount exceeded 100 million won, and documents were forged and used in the process," but added, "Since efforts are being made to recover the damage and to allow for settlement opportunities, the defendant was not detained in court."
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