Regional News
Founder of Thailand’s Yellow Shirts Gets 20 Year Prison Sentence for Fraud
Sondhi, founder of the yellow-shirt People Alliance for Democracy was later escorted by security guards to Bangkok Remand Prison to serve his sentence.
.
.
BANGKOK – The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the lower courts’ 20-year jail sentence on Sondhi Limthongkul, founder of the Manager Media Group, and two former Manager directors for violations of the Securities and Exchange Act.
The court on Tuesday affirmed a lower court’s 2012 ruling that Sondhi Limthongkul and two former Managing directors violated Securities and Exchange Commission regulations in 1996-97 by presenting fraudulent financial data to obtain a large bank loan for the business group.
They were convicted of falsifying documents used as collateral for a 1.08-billion-baht loan from Krung Thai Bank, and failing to seek approval for the loan from the company board.
The loan was arranged for The M Group, a private company controlled by Sondhi and a major shareholder in the listed Manager Media Group.
Sondhi also is the founder of the People’s Alliance for Democracy, which sought to force then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to step down in 2006 for alleged corruption.
Thaksin was then ousted in a military coup, but his supporters and opponents continue to contend for power.
