Prosecutor seeks fine and four-year office ban for Lithuanian lawmaker

LRT reported that a prosecutor has asked a court to find Justas Pankauskas, a member of Lithuania’s Central Electoral Commission, secretary of the Social Democratic Party and former deputy chancellor of the Government, guilty in a case involving allegedly falsified expense claims. The prosecutor also seeks a €5,000 fine and a four-year ban on holding elected or appointed positions in municipalities or municipal companies.

During a hearing at the Alytus District Court on Thursday, Kaunas Regional Prosecutor’s Office prosecutor Darius Valkavičius asked that Pankauskas be convicted of fraud, document forgery and abuse of office.

The charges relate to Pankauskas’s work as a member of the Lazdijai District Municipal Council from 2019 to 2021. Prosecutors suspect that he falsified council member expense reports by submitting inaccurate information about fuel purchases allegedly linked to his council activities.

Investigators believe Pankauskas submitted fuel receipts paid for with other people’s bank cards as his own. Some of the receipts had been paid for using bank cards belonging to his relatives. By presenting the receipts as expenses related to his council duties, he allegedly received €2,516 in unjustified reimbursements from the Lazdijai District Municipal Administration.

The Special Investigation Service found that Pankauskas also included receipts for fuel paid for with the Social Democratic Party’s corporate credit card. In total, 71 payments were made using 31 different bank cards, five of which had been issued to legal entities, including the party and companies engaged in logistics and other activities.

The prosecutor cited one example from October 15, 2019, when Pankauskas included in his report a receipt for diesel printed at a Neste petrol station on Subačiaus Street in Vilnius at 3:14 p.m. The fuel was allegedly paid for in cash. One minute later, according to the report, he purchased petrol and paid by card, followed two minutes later by another diesel receipt also paid for by card.

“Explain to the court: three receipts were taken from an automated petrol station within three minutes. What was the purpose of taking three receipts?” Valkavičius asked.

Pankauskas said he did not remember all the instances of buying fuel.

Prosecutor questions defendant’s remorse

Although Pankauskas says he sincerely admits his guilt, the prosecutor questioned his sincerity and opposed transferring the former council member to the supervision of a guarantor.

Valkavičius said Pankauskas had collected and submitted receipts belonging to individuals and legal entities, clearly understood the nature of the alleged criminal conduct and had acted deliberately over two years in seeking to obtain municipal funds.

The prosecutor said the case had caused significant harm to the Lazdijai municipal administration and damaged its reputation by creating the impression that council members improperly used funds allocated for their activities. He said Pankauskas could only have claimed compensation for expenses related to his official duties.

The prosecutor also opposed exempting the 43-year-old Pankauskas from criminal liability and placing him under the supervision of his father as guarantor.

Valkavičius said there was no basis to conclude that such an arrangement would achieve the aims of punishment or that Pankauskas genuinely regretted his actions. He noted that, during questioning by the Special Investigation Service earlier this year, Pankauskas said he did not admit guilt, submitted prepared written testimony and declined to answer investigators’ questions.

The prosecutor also questioned whether Pankauskas’s father was a trustworthy guarantor, since receipts paid with his card had allegedly been included in his son’s reports and had led to reimbursements.