Singapore - A Singapore court on Thursday sentenced the former executive vice president of Japanese company Mitsui Oil (Asia) to 36 months in jail for aiding a scam that eventually cost the firm 81 million US dollars and led to its liquidation, media reports said. Takahashi Masatsugu, 51, admitted that he helped his then-colleague Noriyuki Yamazaki, 37, at the Singapore-based subsidiary of Japanese trading house Mitsui and Co to cover Yamazaki's losses in trading by reporting false prices for the petroleum product naphtha to the Tokyo head office.
Although Takahashi was not Yamazaki's direct superior, he was in charge of the middle office and back office and gave handwritten instructions to fake profit and loss figures, the online edition of Straits Times newspaper reported.
When Mitsui Tokyo discovered the hefty losses in its Singapore unit and conducted an investigation, the scam came to light in November 2006.
Because of the losses, Mitsui wound up its Singapore subsidiary in February 2007.
Yamazaki had already been sentenced to five years in jail. His direct boss Takayoshi Wada, 46, was sentenced to 20 weeks in jail.
