LNP – Rs.100, 000 bribe, former land officer landed in jail for 22 years
The Colombo High Court yesterday sentenced a retired land officer to 22 years of rigorous imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs.30,000, after finding him guilty of soliciting a bribe of Rs.100,000 to issue a permit for cutting trees on a land within the Mahaweli Zone in Thambuttegama.
The court also ordered that the Rs.100,000 bribe be recovered under Section 26 of the Bribery Act.
Furthermore, the court ordered that a compensation of Rs.100,000 be paid to the aggrieved party, the timber trader.
The convicted accused, V.M. Kamal Manjula was a former officer attached to the Department of Forest Lands. He had been due to retire six months after committing the offence. However, due to his conviction, he now forfeits his entitlement to a government pension.
Under Mahaweli regulations, residents are required to obtain official permits to fell trees on their land. The complainant in this case, a timber trader from the Periyakulama had purchased trees from a property and was engaged in a business of cutting and transporting timber to Moratuwa.
When the complaint requested a permit to cut the trees, the accused allegedly demanded a bribe of Rs.100,000. The complainant had initially paid Rs.25,000, for which the accused issued a permit allowing the felling of only three trees, and subsequently demanded the remaining Rs.75,000 for the full permit.
The complainant reported the matter to the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) via a phone call. A decoy operation was launched, and the suspect was arrested on March 18, 2016, while accepting the bribe money.
CIABOC filed six charges against the accused under the Bribery Act, for soliciting, accepting, and facilitating the acceptance of a bribe.
Delivering the verdict, the High Court Judge ruled that the prosecution had proven the charges beyond reasonable doubt and imposed the sentences accordingly.
The complainant was also awarded Rs. 100,000 in compensation, in view of the losses incurred due to the denial of the tree-cutting permit.