Former CEO arrested by fraud squad as part of probe into 'home improvement' offences

Detectives from the Garda National Economic Crime Bureau (GNECB) questioned the businessman at a south Dublin garda station after his arrest by appointment in the capital today.

Senior sources say that the major company he worked for made a complaint to gardaí in March of last year into an alleged suspicious transaction of around €12,000.

It is understood that this sum was allegedly used by the arrested Dublin-based man in relation to renovation work that he was getting done at his home.

He is a well-known figure in the business world who is aged in his mid-50s and he was not previously known to gardaí.

The €12,000 would have been only a small fraction of his six-figure salary at the time.

The complex nature of the case means that the GNECB has been investigating it for more than a year.

It is alleged that the suspect, who is an Irish national, billed a company which was working for his employers for the €12,000 that was used for his home renovation.

This company, which is not suspected of any involvement in the alleged scam, then billed the multinational company that the suspect was the chief executive officer of at the time.

This led to suspicions and an internal audit being carried out.

The arrested man no longer works for the company which has millions of customers in well over a dozen countries as well as a major operation in Ireland.

The suspect is the latest professional person to be arrested by the GNECB as part of a wide amount of different and complex fraud investigations throughout the country.

Meanwhile, a female solicitor arrested on Tuesday as part of a separate investigation was released without charge from Irishtown Garda Station and a file will now be prepared for the DPP.

She was being questioned as part of a major investigation into false insurance claims.

The solicitor, who is now based in the UK, became a “person of interest” in the lengthy probe after officers received a complaint from one of Ireland’s biggest insurance companies.

Most of the false compensation claims relate to fake traffic accidents that involve individuals who do not exist as real people.

As part of their huge probe, GNECB officers seized around 200 files from this company and discovered around 30 cases of false documentation which is alleged to be used in relation to bogus civil litigation claims.