The Supreme Court has reduced and suspended the prison sentence given to former auditor-general Khunying Jaruvan Maintaka for misusing state funds by taking officials to a religious ceremony instead of attending a seminar in 2003.
The court on Tuesday reduced her one-year prison sentence to nine months, suspended for two years, and the fine of 20,000 baht confirmed by the Appeal Court to 15,000 baht.
The court of the first instance had found the former auditor-general guilty in November 2015 of misusing funds and sentenced her to two years in jail.
The same sentences and fines were also handed by the lower court and the Appeal Court to Khamphi Sonchai, the former director for personnel resources at the Office of the Auditor-General (OAG), who faced the same charge.
Khampi died in March and the Supreme Court subsequently dismissed the case.
The case stemmed from a request Khamphi made to Khunying Jaruvan for approval to organise a seminar, "the OAG in the View of Senators", on Oct 31, 2003 at the City Park Hotel in Nan's Muang district.
Prosecutors said the pair admitted the OAG held a royally-sponsored thod kathin luang robe-giving ceremony at two temples in the same district on the same day. The names of the officials attending the ceremony were the same as those due to attend the seminar, the court was told.
This meant participants in the religious rite put their names down for the seminar so they could claim benefits such as travelling in state transport to the ceremony and spending the night in accommodation paid for by the OAG.
The prosecutors said the October seminar was never held at the City Park Hotel. It was arranged to draw 294,440 baht from the state budget for the benefit of the defendants and others who participated in the kathin ceremony.
In 2004, then Nan governor Peerasawai Ratana-akewapi filed a complaint against Khamphi and Khunying Jaruvan with the National Anti-Corruption Commission.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court said it suspended Khunying Jaruvan's jail sentence because she had never fallen foul of the law before and for her otherwise exemplary work during her time as auditor-general.
The court also noted that Khunying Jaruvan did not use the funds obtained by false pretences for personal gain.