A supervisor at a well-known recycling company and an employee of a scrap metal seller were sentenced to three years in prison and fined BD3,000 for forging signatures and falsifying export documents.
The two expatriates were found guilty of shipping recyclable aluminium to India via sea by claiming that the shipping container was carrying a load of paper waste.
The High Criminal Court found the Indian and Pakistani defendants guilty of collaborating to create a fake invoice for the paper shipment, to use it as a cover to deliver aluminium to India.
They were convicted of fraudulently obtaining an export licence to ship 10 consignments of ‘aluminium waste’ that were falsely declared as paper.
The court also ordered their deportation following the completion of their prison sentences.
Only four containers left Bahrain since the deception was spotted when one of the shipments was randomly scanned with an x-ray cargo inspection machine, the Public Prosecution heard.
Metal was detected in the shipments that were labelled as paper.
Four containers are currently being held at the port and two were with the scrap company and were not yet readied to be sent out.
The expatriates were earlier charged with forgery and with using falsified documents, knowingly presenting them as genuine.
The 47-year-old Indian supervisor was also charged with entering false information into the online system of a governmental body – the Supreme Council for the Environment (SCE) – in order to obtain the licence.
He reportedly filled an application form for an export and import waste licence, and submitted it to the SCE’s Environmental Licensing Portal along with the forged receipt.
The SCE approved the request, granting the well-known recycling company permission to send 10 paper waste containers from Khalifa Bin Salman Port to India.
The 32-year-old Pakistani defendant was charged with collaborating and aiding his co-defendant to obtain the paper waste export permit on false grounds.
According to court documents, the younger defendant had reached out to the older suspect, asking him for a favour on behalf of the scrap metal company he was works for.
He claimed that the company’s commercial registration had been suspended, preventing it from exporting goods.
He said he therefore relied on the Indian national to help deliver scrap aluminium that the company had previously agreed to sell to an Indian firm.
Because the well-known recycling company only deals with plastic and paper, and does not handle aluminium or any other metals as part of its operations, the defendants resorted to lying on the SCE application form to be granted an export permit.
The Indian defendant reportedly admitted to the charges, and an internal investigation in his company found him responsible for forging his manager’s signature on the application form.
zainab@gdnmedia.bh
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