A view of the courthouse in Beirut. (Credit: Claude Assaf)
Beirut’s First Investigative Judge Bilal Halawi questioned the chairwoman of the board of directors, Raya al-Hassan, former interior minister, on Tuesday. The case involves the alleged theft of several million dollars belonging to a BankMed client, M.R., reportedly carried out primarily by the director of the Foch Street branch, S.S., who is currently on the run.
S.S. is said to be a close relative of a former minister and a former MP affiliated with the camp of former Prime Minister Saad Hariri.
The case dates back about 50 days, when the depositor requested the Court of Cassation open a judicial investigation after discovering that his accounts had been emptied.
A preliminary investigation by the public prosecutor reportedly revealed that fraudulent withdrawals were repeatedly made using falsified powers of attorney bearing forged signatures of the depositor.
These powers of attorney allegedly enabled the branch director, S.S., and accomplice employees to collect the funds: The former is said to have approved the withdrawal requests by initialing them, before passing them on for execution to an employee, M.G., assigned to the cash desk. The employee has been in custody since early June, following legal action by the public prosecutor.
Two other individuals have been arrested: F.Y., a former BankMed security guard who is reportedly among the beneficiaries of the forged powers of attorney and A.T., a bank employee responsible for transmitting mail between the bank’s branches.
Both are said to have received commissions or percentages on each withdrawal.
Hassan was questioned Tuesday as a witness, not in her capacity as chairwoman of BankMed. A request to initiate a judicial investigation does not constitute direct legal action against the bank. Such a request is submitted to the public prosecutor for investigation of potential criminal offenses. Based on the outcome, the prosecutor then decides whom to charge.
In this case, brought by the client M.R., the prosecutor did not charge BankMed but only some of its employees.
On Monday, however, M.R. filed a direct lawsuit against the bank. As a result, Hassan is expected to be questioned later in her official capacity.
According to our information, Judge Bilal Halawi has scheduled a hearing next week to question an employee responsible for reviewing the bank’s accounting records.
Hassan may be questioned as chairwoman once the judicial investigation and the direct lawsuit are merged into a single case file.
This article was translated from L'Orient-Le Jour by Sahar Ghoussoub.
