The 44-year-old man came to court accused by the Public Prosecution Service (MP) of six document forgery crimes, 13 computer forgery crimes and 13 embezzlement crimes, in an apparent contest with 13 misuses of power crimes.

At the beginning of the trial, the accused confessed to the panel of judges, showed regret and justified that it was a complicated phase of life in which he contracted debts and was involved “in a snowball”.

The defendant held the position of technician in the Department of Administration and Finance of the Montalegre Chamber, where he was responsible for contracting goods and services and for insurance.

According to the indictment, the man seized about 66,000 Euros, referring to insurance premiums and financial support given to a Montalegre association.

The scam was detected in 2017 and the civil servant was fired in February 2018.

The prosecution states that the defendant had access to the municipality's computerized accounting bases and changed customer records so that payments were transferred from the municipality to his bank account and then re-entered the system and reset the number of the original account.

Subsequently, the defendant restored most of the "unlawfully appropriated amounts". The municipality of Montalegre also requests the return of 1,544 Euros.

Because the defendant assumed the crimes it was not necessary to produce evidence and the final allegations were read immediately.

The panel of judges set the reading of the judgment to 21 October.