Destiny’s Rafiqul sentenced to 12 years in prison
A Dhaka court has sentenced 46 persons, including Destiny Group’s managing director Rafiqul Amin, to different terms in a case filed on the allegations of money embezzlement and laundering.
Judge Sheikh Nazmul Alam of Dhaka Special Judge's Court-4 handed down the verdict on Thursday. The hearings on the arguments of both the parties in this case filed against the Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society on the allegation of money laundering and embezzlement ended on 27 March.
Rafiqul has been sentenced to 12 years in prison with a fine of Tk 2 billion. Destiny chairman Mohammad Hossain has been sentenced to 10 years in prison with a fine of Tk 15 million.
M Harun-ur-Rashid, president of destiny and former army chief, has been sentenced to four years in prison with a fine of Tk 35 million.
The rest of the accused have been sentenced to five to nine years in prison with fine.
Rafiqul, Harun-ur-Rashid and seven others were present in the court when the verdict was announced. The court ordered to send them to jail.
Harn-ur-Rashid’s lawyer Moinul Islam told Prothom Alo that his client was not a member of Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society. He was not involved in the decision making of the society. Harun-ur-Rashid did not get justice. He will go to the High Court to appeal against this verdict
On 31 July 2012, two separate cases were filed with the Kalabagan police station against Rafiqul and other officials of Destiny on the allegation of embezzling money from the investors in the name of Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society and Destiny Tree Plantation Limited and laundering it. According to the statements in these two cases, a total of Tk 41.19 billion has been embezzled and laundered.
After a two-year investigation, the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) submitted the charge sheet against 19, including Rafiqul in the case filed against Destiny Tree Plantation Limited. Charge sheet was filed against 46 people in the case filed against Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society.
The total number of accused in the two cases is 53. Of them, 12, including Rafiqul are accused in both cases. Of the accused, Destiny chairman Mohammad Hossain and MD Rafiqul are in prison at the moment.
Apart from Mohammad Hossain and Rafiqul, the other accused in the money laundering case of Destiny Multipurpose Cooperative Society are - M Harun-ur-Rashid, Mohammad Gofranul Haque, Mohammad Saeed-ur-Rahman, Mezbah Uddin, Syed Sajjad Hossain, Irfan Ahmed, Farah Diba, Jamshed Ara Chowdhury, Sheikh Taibur Rahman, Nepal Chandra Biswas, Zakir Hossain, Azad Rahman, Akbar Hossain, Mohammad Abul Kalam Azad, Saidul Islam Khan, Sumon Ali Khan, Shirin Akhtar, Rafiqul Islam Sarkar, Mojibur Rahman, Didarul Alam, M Haider Uzzaman , Joynal Abedin, Kazi Md. Fazlul Karim, Mollah Al Amin, Shafiul Islam, Ziaul Haque Mollah, Sikder Kabirul Islam, Firoz Alam, Omar Farooq, Sunil Baran Karmakar, Farid Akhtar, S Sahiduzzaman Choyan, Abdur Rahman, Sakibuzzaman, SM Ahsanul Kabir, AHM Au , GM Golam Kibria, Atiqur Rahman, Khandaker Benazir Ahmed, AKM Safiullah, Shah Alam, Delwar Hossain, Jasmine Akter and Shafiqul Haque.
A total of Tk 19.01 billion was collected from the investors in the name of Destiny Multipurpose Co-operative Society. The ACC investigation revealed that, of that money more than Tk 18.61 billion had been embezzled. Some 850,000 investors were affected due to this embezzlement.
According to the indictments in the other case, since 2008, a total of Tk 24.45 billion was collected from the investors through Destiny Tree Plantation. Of this, more than Tk 22.57 billion was embezzled. As a result, some 1.7 million investors were affected. The case statement said that some Tk 561.9 million of this was laundered by mean of LC and some USD206,000 was laundered directly.
The trial began on 24 August 2016, with the submission of the charge sheet against Rafiqul and others some four years after the case was lodged. The testimony of 202 people was taken in the cases.
ACC public prosecutor Mir Ahmed Ali Salam said the same court was hearing the case filed on the allegations of embezzling money from investors in the name of Destiny Tree Plantation Limited and laundering these funds.