Angola: Businessman Carlos São Vicente sentenced to nine years in prison

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Angola: Businessman Carlos São Vicente sentenced to nine years in prison

6:56 CAT | 24 Mar 2022

Photo: Lusa

Luso-Angolan businessman Carlos São Vicente was sentenced to nine years in prison on Thursday by the District Court of Luanda, and the payment of compensation of US$500 million (€454 million), the defence announced.

Carlos de São Vicente, the husband of Irene Neto, daughter of the first president of Angola, was sentenced for embezzlement, money laundering and tax fraud, and the defence said that he would appeal against the sentence.

Asked by Lusa, Carlos São Vicente’s defence lawyer, Edson Escrivão, said the judge’s decision for the case “was not unanimous.

“There was a dissenting vote to several irregularities” registered during the trial, which began on 11 February.

Held in preventive custody since September 2020, the crimes against Carlos São Vicente, according to the indictment, involved amounts exceeding €1 billion.

For almost two decades, the businessman had a monopoly on insurance and reinsurance for Angolan state oil company Sonangol is said to have set up a triangular scheme with companies in Angola, London and Bermuda, which led to losses to the Angolan Treasury.

With this scheme, and according to the same document, Carlos São Vicente, owner of one of the most prominent private business groups in Angola at the time, also managed to keep the insurance and reinsurance business profits from any of the other co-insurers, such as public insurer ENSA, thus damaging those companies, as well as Sonangol itself.

According to the accusation, Carlos São Vicente created from a certain time onwards a “kind of business with himself, within the AAA group [of which he was the owner], causing the embezzlement of public funds”.

The charges and the “excessive pre-trial detention” were repeatedly contested by the defence, which now promises to appeal against the sentence in the 3rd Criminal Section of the Luanda District Court.

Journalists boycotted the coverage of the hearings of this trial after they were prevented from accessing the room on the first day of the trial of Carlos São Vicente at the “request of the defence”.

On that occasion, a court official informed journalists that they should not capture images or audio but only take notes. The press professionals refused as they considered it an impediment because it was a public hearing.

Source: Lusa