On Tuesday, the court also intended to hear the defendants' speeches. However, Viktor Uspaskich, Vitalija Vonžutaitė, Vytautas Gapšys, and Marina Liutkevičienė asked the court for more time to prepare. The court satisfied the plea and said that the closing statements should be made next Monday.
After the court hears the closing remarks on June 10, the three-member panel of judges will retire to write the verdict.
Lawyers of Uspaskich, Gapšys, and Vonžutaitė urged the court to find the defendants not guilty, while the defense lawyer of the party's former treasury, Liutkevičienė, asked for a milder punishment for her client. The lawyer of the Labor Party as a legal entity suggested that the charges against the party be dropped altogether.
Prosecutor Saulius Verseckas suggested confiscating the illegal money – over 25 million litas (EUR 7.3m) – used for the party's operations, also saying that the party should pay a fine of 1.25 million litas. The Labor Party may also have to cover the 3.8 million litas claim to the State Tax Inspectorate and the state-run social insurer Sodra.
Verseckas suggests that Uspaskich be sent to prison for six years for organizing fraudulent bookkeeping and other crimes; MP Vonžutaitė is offered five years and Gapšys, the parliamentary vice-speaker, two years behind the bars.
Liutkevičienė, who cooperated with investigators by disclosing some circumstances of the bookkeeping fraud, should be sent to prison for one year, said the prosecutor.
The Labor Party is on trial for failing to include more than 24 million litas in income and 23 million litas in spending in its books in the 2004-2006 period. Charges have been brought against its leader Viktor Uspaskich, his deputy Vytautas Gapšys, MP Vitalija Vonžutaitė, the party's former accountant Marina Liutkevičienė and the party as a legal entity.
