BCA employee jailed for embezzlement

JAKARTA (JP): West Jakarta District Court sentenced an executive of privately run Bank Central Asia (BCA) yesterday to eight months in jail for swindling Rp 396 million from customers.

Presiding judge Parwoto said Budiyanto Teguh, 33, the customer service head of the BCA branch on Jl. Gajah Mada, was proven guilty of misappropriating the funds from the accounts of 34 customers between February 1996 and October 1997.

"The defendant has damaged people's trust in the banking industry, especially the customers' trust in BCA," Parwoto said.

But he said the panel of judges also considered the polite behavior of the defendant during the trial, his acknowledgement of his crime and the fact he had ceded his home to the bank as compensation in deciding on sentencing.

In committing the crime, Parwoto said the father of three learned how to operate computers at the bank from his subordinates, identified as Kristin, Dwi and Hari.

The defendant transferred funds from customers to his account after acquiring the computer passwords of the subordinates, he said. "He then withdrew the (transferred) money from the bank's automatic teller machines."

Budiyanto transferred funds when his subordinates were at lunch or reporting the bank's daily transactions at Bank Indonesia, he said.

The scam remained undetected for months because Budiyanto identified rarely used accounts.

But it unraveled when several customers reported their money had been withdrawn without their authorization.

Parwoto said the defendant was proved guilty of violating Article 374 of the Criminal Code, which carries a maximum punishment of five years in jail.

Both prosecutor Baskara and the defendant are considering whether to appeal.

Baskara earlier asked the court to sentence Budiyanto to one year in jail. (jun)