Proceedings against Minister of Social Affairs and Health Hanna Mäntylä, who is suspected of fraud, are advancing to consideration of charges. Mäntylä, a 41-year-old second-term Finns Party MP from Tornio, became a minister in late May.
She is suspected of committing fraud in 2010, when she received 5100 euros in state legal aid for the indigent on the grounds that she was a single mother. Prosecutors say she had in fact been in a common-law marriage with an affluent man since 2006, which would have precluded her from receiving the benefit.
The following year Mäntylä was elected to Parliament, where she represents Lapland. A former nurse and social worker, Mäntylä also owned a lingerie shop in Lahti, which went out of business in 2004.
Statute of limitations to be extended?
The five-year statute of limitations ran out at the beginning of this month – around the time when the allegations were revealed by gossip magazine 7 päivää (also known as "Seiska"). However District Prosecutor Maija Aarto has filed for an extension of the statute of limitations.
Aarto rationalises this by arguing that police received information about the case very late – last July – and that it is in the interest of the common good for the investigation to be pursued. The District Court of Lapland is to rule next Wednesday on whether to extend the statute of limitations.
The case is not being pursued by a prosecutor general, as those involving high-ranking officials usually are, since Mäntylä was not even an MP at the time covered by the allegations.
Mäntylä denies any wrongdoing.