Forging invoices at National Blood Bank

KUALA LUMPUR: A former despatch clerk has been ordered to enter his defence for 17 counts of using forged invoices to make payments at the National Blood Bank.

David Santhakumar Nachiappan, 41, who is now a driver, was said to have used 17 fake invoices when he made payments for more than 300 packets of blood purchased at the payment counter of the blood bank between Jan 8, 2003 and Feb 13, 2003.

Sessions Court judge Mohd Zaki Abdul Wahab ruled that the prosecution had succeeded in proving a prima facie case against the accused.

“I found from the evidence that David knew that the invoices were forged and had used such documents to make payments at the ... blood bank,” he said on Wednesday.

Upon hearing the verdict, David, who was accompanied by his wife, was expressionless.

The judge set Oct 2 for David to enter his defence.

A total of 14 prosecution witneses had testified in the forgery trial since July 1.

His lawyer, V. Rajadevan, confirmed to the judge that only David, who is on RM10,000 bail, would testify in the defence’s case.

Mohd Zaki had on Aug 26 freed David of 254 similar charges after the prosecution said they only wanted to proceed with the remaining 17 charges.

DPP Fazril Sani Mohamed Fadzil had on Aug 26 applied to the court to grant a discharge not amounting to an acquittal against David for the 254 charges. However, the judge acquitted and discharged him.

David, who was formerly attached to the Ampang Puteri Specialist Hospital, had on Aug 22, 2005 claimed trial to 271 counts of forgery. He was alleged to have committed the offences between January 2002 and December 2003 at the same place.

He had also faced 271 alternative charges of cheating seven assistant financial administrators at the payment counter throughout the same period.

He was accused of deceiving them into believing that the forged invoices were genuine which resulted in them accepting payments ranging from RM20 to RM180 for the bags of blood stated in the documents.

DPP Fazril told The Star later that the prosecution had filed an appeal over David’s acquittal of the 254 charges.