In the complaint, which has already been accepted for processing, it was noted that "knowingly", workers and/or executives of the Chilean state copper company "contracted services that were not fully used under extremely burdensome conditions."
Through a complaint, the State Defense Council (CDE) accused a series of irregular events that had occurred within Codelco and that, together with defrauding the Treasury, would have generated property damage to the Chilean state company that amounted to US$ 13 million.
The legal action, which was already accepted for processing by the 7th Guarantee Court of Santiago, stated that in the context of maintenance of a furnace located in the Chuquicamata Division, that work was awarded to a company called Outotec Chile, in 2017. .
To that company, the complaint stated, unjustified and high payments were transferred.
As detailed, and through a tender to carry out the maintenance and cleaning of the oven, said firm managed to advance over two others that participated: the service had a cost of US$ 8.8 million and a time of four months was estimated. to carry out the work.
The irregularities
The complaint arose from the details revealed by an audit carried out by the Chilean Copper Commission (Cochilco).
It was noted that the tender did not have complete transparency and that "the date of receipt of the offers by the process manager was modified without notifying the bidders, which favored the company Outotec, since it allowed it to upload its offer in the portal out of time.”
After recounting a series of procedures, the complaint maintained that in the context of the administration and execution of the contract, “multiple situations of criminal relevance were verified, such as the contracting of the most onerous of the available options, without justified cause.”
Likewise, “the failure to provide proportional discounts for services not provided by the winning company was questioned; the non-imposition of fines for delays and non-compliance in application of the respective contractual clauses, among others.”
And for fines (against non-compliance by the company that was awarded the tender), he cited that the audit carried out by Cochilco indicated that Codelco “should have collected US$ 2.2 million.”
The audit report estimated the economic detriment for Codelco, as a result of the failures and deviations originating in the provision of the contracted service, at US$ 13.4 million.
“Wilful conduct”
The facts, it was accused in the complaint, would reveal “a whole network of malicious conduct (…)” on the part of the state mining company and an “economically inefficient ―and evidently burdensome― disposition of fiscal assets, which is produced by “a willful violation of official duties by workers and/or executives of Codelco.”
It was alluded to that these workers and/or executives, “knowingly, contracted completely unused services under extremely burdensome conditions for the public company.”
According to the antecedents - and the form, amounts and contract involved - the complaint pointed out that the fraud could have been carried out “by an official who intervenes in the respective operation due to his position, a matter that matters that the unfairness corresponds to a detriment patrimonial caused from within the public administration.”
Due to the above, the judicial action requested that a criminal complaint be filed “against all those who are responsible as authors, accomplices or accessories to the completed crime of fraud against the Treasury (…)”.
