December 11th, 2012 Hearing: Santa Claus Comes into the Trial

On Tuesday, December 11^th, 2012 the trial of the 15 associates of the Budapest Public Transport Company (BKV) continued in the Hungarian city of Kecskemét.  The subject of the hearing was Santa Claus and his Christmas program, sort of. 

Twelfth defendant László Mátai, who is accused of being an accomplice in the misappropriation of public funds and aiding in a criminal organization, denied all of the charges against him. 

Mátai charges are directly related to contracts between BKV and two other Hungarian companies, Sporting Life Media Ltd. (SLM) and F.F.V.D. Lp.  It is alleged that the two companies were contacted to fulfill contract work by the office of Mátai’s current wife and the sixth defendant in the case, Éva Mátai. 

Sometime in 2007 Éva Mátai, who at the time was a public relations officer for the public transport company, purportedly discussed the eighth defendant, Miklós Regőczi, the organization of a Christmas program which BKV would help fund and organize.  According to the indictment, Éva told Regőczi that she would organize a contract with SLM, although Regőczi knew that F.F.V.D Lp. would already receive the Christmas program contract, he was aware that he could not refuse her instructions. 

Evidently, SLM sub-contracted the work to F.F.V.D. in agreement that the latter would use the former’s name and SLM received 8% of the contract value. 

And how does Mr. Mátai fit into this complicated web? 

The prosecution claims that the contracts were created with SLM regardless of the previous agreement because Mr. Mátai was directly involved in the company.

In court on the 11^th László stated that his wife could have never ordered the contract with SLM.  He claims that instead of organizing the Christmas program his wife was working as an advisor for the infamous line 4 in the subway network.  Therefore, she was in no way connected to the 2007 Christmas event.

Regardless of Mr. Mátai’s claims, the prosecution continued to question him about the Christmas program, which included inquiries into the attire of Santa Claus.  This, of course, generated a lot of laughs amongst those in attendance.   

Throughout the trial thus far, many of the defendants and followers belonging to the public has suspected the prosecutions motivations for placing these 15 individuals on trial.  One prevalent theme has been political motivations.  During the hearing the prosecution addressed these “ulterior motivation” claims for the first time: According to the lead prosecutor, the 15 defendants were chosen because of prior evidence indicating the group of organizing a criminal network.  This, however, caused an outcry from the defendants as they claimed no credible sources have been interviewed or served as witnesses in the high-profile case.


Source: http://thehagyocase.wordpress.com/2013/01/03/december-11th-2012-hearing-santa-claus-comes-into-the-trial/