Judgments | Deceiving the city of Helsinki for a decade led to long sentences: now the court has reduced the punishments

One one of the biggest public administration corruption cases of this decade reached yet another end point when the Helsinki Court of Appeal issued its verdict this week.

In 2021, the Helsinki District Court sentenced the former The Information Management Manager of the Helsinki City Education Agency Hannu Suoniemi to a prison sentence of more than three years for aggravated crimes. For ten years, Suoniemi ordered equipment at the city’s expense without the equipment ever being delivered to the Education Agency. The devices ended up being sold on through Suoniemi.

Suoniemi made profits of more than eight million euros by cheating. For years, the Education Agency paid non-existent invoices for almost seven million euros.

Helsinki the recent decision of the court of appeals concerns three men to whom Suoniemi sold the equipment he ordered in cash transactions at a bargain price. The men sold the equipment they bought on to private individuals. The crime was long-lasting and the defendants made large profits.

The Helsinki district court previously convicted the men of gross fraud. Vesa Tapani Koste was sentenced to two years and ten months in prison at the time, and two other men to shorter sentences.

However, the Court of Appeal came to a milder decision. According to the court, the men did not know where the equipment sold by Suoniemi came from and therefore the men did not mislead the city of Helsinki.

Court of Appeal convicted the trio of aggravated money laundering instead of aggravated fraud. Kosten’s sentence was reduced to one year and ten months of suspended imprisonment, and the other two men received suspended sentences of less than one year. The Court of Appeal justified the men’s sentences, as the trial had lasted an unreasonably long time.

In addition to the prison sentence, the men are obliged to compensate the city of Helsinki for the proceeds of crime in the amount of almost 500,000 euros.

The crimes dealt with in the verdict took place between 2009 and 2015. In addition to Suoniemi, embezzlement convictions have also been handed out to two employees of the City of Helsinki at the time.