A witness in the ongoing criminal case against the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and owner of Beige Bank, Mike Nyinaku, told the Accra High Court that the accused supervised the issuance of misleading investment certificates to unsuspecting customers, who believed they were investing with the Bank.
Julius Ayivor, the first prosecution witness, a chartered accountant, with auditing and advisory firm, KPMG, disclosed this during cross examination conducted by the counsel for accused, Mr Thaddeus Sory.
Julius Ayivor told the court presided over by Justice Afia Serwaa Asare-Botwe, a Court of Appeal judge sitting with additional responsibility as a High Court judge, that Nyinaku instructed transfer of customers’ monies from Beige Bank to a sister company, Beige Capital Asset Management, which was also owned by the accused.
However, Mr Sorry suggested to the witness that customer funds that had allegedly been siphoned from Beige Bank to Beige Capital Asset Management were done in the ordinary course of Beige Bank’s business.
Mr Sory argued that customers’ monies with the Bank formed part of the Bank’s property and are not the property of shareholders or customers, who deposited those funds/monies with the Bank.
In his response, MrAyivor explained that even though, customers’ funds/monies with Beige Bank became the property of the Bank, those funds/monies equally stood to the credit of those customers to whom the Bank had an obligation to pay back those funds/monies, when those customers made a request for them.
The facts of the case as narrated by Alfred Tuah-Yeboah, Deputy Attorney General, were as follows: Mike Nyinaku was the former CEO of the Beige Bank Limited and on August 1, 2018, Bank of Ghana revoked the banking license of Beige Bank and placed it in receivership.
A review of the financial and other records of the Bank conducted by the Receiver and his team revealed several suspicious and unusual transactions, which were subsequently reported to the law enforcement agencies for investigation.
The Deputy AG said the investigations conducted revealed that between 2015 and 2018, the accused as CEO of the Bank had allegedly used various means to transfer huge sums of monies to companies related to him and for his personal benefit.
Mike Nyinaku is standing trial on 43 counts of stealing, fraudulent breach of trust and money laundering, involving the siphoning of a total of GH¢1.3 billion from the defunct Beige Bank between 2015 and 2018.
Mr. Nyinaku, whose initial GH¢200 million bail conditions have been varied by the Court of Appeal has pleaded not guilty to the alleged theft. The accused person was charged with stealing, fraudulent breach of trust, and money laundering, which he denied in Court.
The accused has since been granted bail to the sum of GHc200 million with three sureties with two of the sureties the court said should be justified with landed property equivalent to the bail bond and the assets should be valued by the Architectural and Engineering Services Limited (AESL) or Land Valuation Division of the Lands Commission.
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