The Criminal Court on Tuesday sentenced Pol Lt Chaowarin Latthasaksiri, former deputy education minister, to one and a half year in jail for embezzling more than 11 million baht from a Cambodian company.
The judge said its ruling was based on his "ignorance" to return the money to the company when the firm found that it transferred money to a wrong bank account, following their trade deal with a Thai firm.
Though the court found no evidence for his alleged plots to fool the Cambodian company into giving him the money, Pol Lt Chaowarin's failure to do the right thing subjected him to the same penalty as cheating, according to the court's ruling.
The court also ordered him to pay 11.4 million baht back to the Cambodian company.
The former Pheu Thai MP has been in hot water since last year when prosecutors brought his case to the court. The 70-year-old was accused of violating the Criminal Code and the Computer Crime Act.
According to the ruling, Pol Lt Chaowarin, along with other suspects who are still at large, allegedly changed information in an invoice sent through an email by TPI Polene Plc to its Cambodian partner BPC Trading which bought cement from the Thai firm.
TPI Polene informed BPC Trading to transfer 11.4 million baht to its TMB Bank account, but such information was allegedly changed to a Krung Thai Bank account, owned by a Thai and Chinese Buddhist Culture association, of which Pol Lt Chawarin was a chairman.
Pol Lt Chawarin later allegedly transferred about 10 million baht to his creditors and about 600,000 baht to his own bank account.
When the mistake was uncovered, police told Pol Lt Chawarin to return the money to BPC Trading. He made an agreement to settle it in three months but failed to keep his words, citing a need to check whether the money belonged to the company.
However, the court viewed his act was dishonest.
Pol Lt Chawarin asked the court to release him on bail in order to appeal against the ruling. The court later released him on bail for a surety of 1 million baht.