Laszlo Bige
18 December 2020
Hungarian businessman Laszlo Bige was arrested on Thursday on suspicion of a string of economic crimes including graft and misappropriation worth billions of forints. Bige is said to have a net worth of $385million and he is 10th richest man in Hungary. He owns fertiliser company Nitrogenmuvek and several other companies.
He is alleged to have received $2.73 million in bribes and misappropriated $6.8million from his own company.
According to the indictment, Bige received 373,000 EUR from one of the partners of his factory and put the money into his own pockets instead of putting the money in the company.
Prosecutors alleged that Bige sold part of his company’s products at a discount to an accomplice stating that they were below standard. The accomplice then sold the goods at market price and they divided the profits between the two of them. He is said to have made $2.72 million in this way.
In 2018 he was arrested for violations in waste management law and his sulphuric acid plant was shut down. But later the court ruled that the shutting down of the factory was illegal.
The authorities did not identify Bige by name. They mentioned him as an “entrepreneur from Nyiregyhaza”. They also said that there was another similar case pending against him. This description perfectly fits Bige. Besides his son acknowledged to Reuters that his father had been detained.
Yahoo News reported.
