DUBAI // A police corporal forged 1,555 medical insurance certificates and used them to embezzle more than Dh2 million.
Dubai Criminal Court sentenced Sudanese H M, 51, to three years and fined him Dh2.323m, while also ordering him to repay the same amount to the police department he stole from. He has fled the country so was sentenced in absentia.
The man was employed by Dubai Police at the Services and Medical Treatment Department and was responsible for matters relating to police patients, with a focus on officers who were being sent abroad by police for treatment. He forged certificates to make out that 1,555 people had been sent abroad for treatment then embezzled the Dh2.3m cost of the fake procedures.
H M was found guilty of embezzlement, forging official documents and using forged official documents.
Pakistani S A, a 44-year-old travel agent, was found guilty of aiding and abetting the corporal. He was present and was jailed for three months.
Records stated that an internal audit discovered the scam, which took place between January 2008 and October 2011. The audit was ordered after a high-ranking officer visited the department to inspect it.
“He [the defendant] was asked about the cost of treatment for one person and he answered Dh100. He then showed us a template insurance certificate, which had the names of nine people, but its value was Dh1,000, not Dh900 as it should be,” said Lt Col K S, 39, who was accompanying the high-ranking officer during his visit.
An investigation revealed that the defendant had embezzled the cost of the treatments, in addition to the visa and flight costs. Police retrieved many forgeries from H M’s computer.
K S had interrogated the defendant, who denied all charges, saying he had documents that could prove his innocence and he would present them on the subsequent working day, which was a Sunday.
“On the morning of Sunday November 11, 2011, I was stunned to learn that the defendant had left the country,” K S said.
salamir@thenational.ae
