FORGOTTEN WAR FUND

Evening Star, Issue 20318, 29 October 1929, Page 12

FORGOTTEN WAR FUND

REVELATIONS IN DENMARK LARGE SUM EMBEZZLED. The suicide not long ago in Denmark of Gustav Arendrup, a well-known man in an important and trusted position in the Ministry of Commerce, aroused the suspicion of his superiors, and an investigation revealed that during a period of six years Arendrup had embezzled sums totalling a Quarter of a million kroner from a fund which had been in his sol© charge. The fund, which amounted to one million kroner, had accrued from a war-time marine insurance scheme.

The money had been deposited in the Landmands Bank, and the account book placed in a safe deposit box to which only Arendrup had a key. Owing to the frequent changes of Ministry no proper _ record of the fund had been kept; in fact, the former Minister of Commerce makes the startling statement that he had no knowledge winterer of its existence!

Only through a belated payment to the fund was attention suddenly called to the matter, and Arendrup was informed that the accounts in this connection would now be examined and settlement made. A few’ days later the Ministry was notified by Arendrup’s wife that her husband was dead, and it became known that he had shot himse'l.

Following on this affair the various Ministers instituted an examination of all financial matters, and as a result an embezzlement of 60,000 kroner from a trust fund in the Ministry of Justice is reported. In this case the culprit had, in 1911, omitted to include a certain trust fund in the list of such funds kept by the Ministry, and had appropriated the money gradually since that date..