A chief technician from the Association of Municipalities Terra Quente Transmontana, based in Mirandela, was accused of corruption by the Ministry of Public Administration (MP) for allegedly receiving 500 euros in favor of a company in this city in the Bragança region.
Target was detained in November by the Judicial Police (PJ) and is now formally charged with “assisting a competitor in a public procurement procedure by providing confidential information in exchange for money” in a case involving a total of four defendants.
The MP’s indictment of 31 March was released today by the Porto District Attorney’s Office, stating that the defendants are a senior technical officer of the Association of Municipalities of Terra Quente Transmontana. [AMTQT]an occupational health services company and two defendants, one of whom is a managing partner of that company and the other a senior occupational health and safety specialist, also with ties to the defendant in a commercial company.
According to the indictment, the senior technician “was charged with two offenses of passive corruption and the other defendants with two offenses of active corruption.”
The deputy considered it indictable that the managing partner of the company asked the labor protection specialist to contact the specialist who was in charge of the occupational health and hygiene department of the association of municipalities.
According to the indictment, the purpose was that, having access to privileged and confidential information about public tenders conducted by the association, the technician would support the company in public tenders in the field of occupational safety and health, “in exchange for the surrender of money.”
According to the order, the technician “accepted” and “in the tenders for the purchase of occupational health services promoted by AMTQT for 2015 and 2018, she indicated to the respondent managing partner the cost of the lowest offer of competing companies. so he was able to submit the lowest bid on behalf of his own company, which he did, and the contracts were awarded.”
The deputy indicates that he found evidence of “a transfer of at least 500 euros by the respondent’s managing partner to a superior technical defendant with reference to this agreement.”
The indictment also requests that “in addition to the criminal conviction, the defendant’s managing partner and the defendant company be ordered to pay the state the sum of 54,206 euros and the technical manager of the defendant to pay the sum of 500 euros in property the advantage they had. with a wrongdoing.”
The senior technician was detained on November 22, 2022 by the Trial Chamber, which indicated on this occasion that “two more people and a company were brought in as defendants, and evidence related to the offenses in question was seized.
The court specified that “the investigation made it possible to establish that the suspect, at least from 2015, will violate her official duties in the process of concluding contracts for the provision of services” and that the behavior of the detainee caused “damage to the public purse”.
The Association of Municipalities Terra Quente Transmontana covers the five municipalities of the District of Bragança, namely Alfandega da Fe, Macedo de Cavaleiros, Mirandela, Vila Flor and Carraceda de Anciaes.
This association, like other partners across the country, has the mission of finding joint solutions for the municipalities that make up it, in areas ranging from education to the environment, planning, public health and others.
Author: Portuguese
Source: CM Jornal
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