PNGBlogs
12/04/2017
Anti-corruption police in Papua New Guinea arrest one of the country's top judges and charge him with judicial corruption.
Bernard Sakora being brought into Boroko Police Station in Port Moresby. (Credit: ABC)
Anti-corruption police in Papua New Guinea have arrested one of the country's top judges and charged him with judicial corruption.
Bernard Sakora being brought into Boroko Police Station in Port Moresby. (Credit: ABC)
Anti-corruption police in Papua New Guinea have arrested one of the country's top judges and charged him with judicial corruption.
Police said Supreme Court judge Bernard Sakora accepted a 100,000 kina ($45,000) payment in 2009 from a company linked to Paul Paraka Lawyers, a law firm accused of defrauding the PNG Government of millions of dollars via inflated legal bills.
The director of PNG's National Fraud and Anti-Corruption Directorate, Matthew Damaru, said his officers came across the payment while investigating the complex and long-running case. "The arrest is a result of ongoing investigations to the payment of legal bills to Paul Paraka Lawyers where this payment to the judge was discovered and the investigation conducted into the payment made," he said. "He [Bernard Sakora] denied receiving the money."
