Heads of Georgian construction company arrested for fraud

The heads of the construction-developer company Sveti have been arrested today on charges of fraud, misappropriation of funds and abuse of authority, the Investigation Service of Georgia's Ministry of Finance said.

"We would like to underline that on the basis of an application lodged by the future owners of the construction-developer company Sveti on 29 May 2018 an investigation was initiated into a case of the misappropriation of funds by the abovementioned company, which was paid by citizens to purchase residential apartments," the press release by the Investigation Service says.

"Evidence obtained by the investigative activities confirm that the indictees G.J. and T.J., were intentionally using their official positions to deliberately take possession of large amounts of money belonging to citizens. For this purpose, construction-development company Sveti announced the commencement of large-scale housing construction projects in the beginning of 2016… In order to acquire large amounts of money, active advertising campaigns, including on social networks, were conducted to attract local and foreign residents interested in purchasing a flat”, the press release added.

The investigation revealed that G.J. and T.J. fraudulently acquired 3,356,385 GEL, Agenda.ge reported.