Archive for January 13th, 2011
Bridger pursues complaint re-Operation Tempura
(CNS): The trials and tribulations following the UK’s Special Investigation Team (a.k.a. SPIT) and Operation Tempura are back in the news. A feature piece in today’s edition of the UK’s Financial Times reveals that the story is not over. Martin Bridger (left), the Senior Investigating Officer and head of SPIT, who was driven out after the entire operation was discredited (but not after it had cost Cayman millions of dollars), is pursuing an official complaint against the FCO and the Governor’s Office. The UK paper reveals that the current governor has asked a London-based QC for advice on how to handle the complaints and Benjamin Aina reportedly gave Duncan Taylor a report on the matter just before Christmas. (Photo from the UK’s Daily Mail)
Last year UK barrister Martin Polaine, who was the anti-corruption legal expert that advised Bridger during Operation Tempura, was disbarred from the profession as a result of his involvement in the case which had led to the unlawful arrest of Justice Alex Henderson. He told CNS in November that he had dropped the complaint he had made to the Foreign and Commonwealth and the Governor’s Office against “those who behaved in certain ways in relation to Operation Tempura” as he had lost faith and trust in the enquiries.
Polaine said he had no confidence in Aina but when pressed would not reveal the details of the complaint or why he was no longer pursuing it. “It would be inappropriate of me to go into detail at this stage. I can simply say that my complaint related to sections of the judiciary, to the Attorney General’s Chambers and the FCO. Given that Mr Aina’s enquiries may be continuing, notwithstanding my withdrawal, I am unable to say any more at the moment,” he told CNS.
“‘I stand by what I have told them, but can go on as a complainant no longer. My life has been ruined, even though I was acting in good faith at all times and was simply seeking to conduct myself professionally and properly. I now know that I have been beaten,” the former attorney added.
Bridger, however, appears not to have been beaten and is continuing to pursue the complaint which had originally been made by both men.
According to the FT, which says it has Aina’s report, Bridger and Polaine complain that the chief justice, who had made an earlier ruling in the case, spoke to Justice Henderson outside the courtroom about his relationship with John Evans, the former Net News journalist involved in the issues, which triggered the arrival of SPIT in Cayman. They also say the chief justice went to see Henderson at the police station after his detention and, without notifying the arresting officers, spoke to him in a private room.
In a February 2008 judgment, the chief justice said he did not think he should recuse himself from the case over perceived bias but had said the Tempura investigators were free to challenge his decision.
Polaine and Bridger question the role of Sir Peter Cressell, the former UK judge who presided over Henderson’s judicial review and was later appointed to the Cayman Financial Court. Polaine claims Sir Peter made findings of bad faith without supporting evidence and questions why the judge met with Anthony Smellie after arriving on the islands to hear the review. Cresswell maintains that he remained independent throughout and kept a distance from those involved.
The complaint also questions the role of Larry Covington (raised here in Cayman on a number of occasions without receiving answers) a Foreign Office law enforcement adviser whose part in the Operation Tempura fiasco has never been fully explained. Stuart Kernohan, the former police commissioner who was sacked during the investigation, had reportedly told Covington about the Cayman Net News office search. The FT further reveals that it too failed to get any further on the question of Covington as he referred the paper to the FCO press office, which did not comment.
The complaint dossier includes the issue of the allegations which were later supposedly examined under Operation Cealt by the temporary police commissioner, James Smith. Polaine states in the complaint, “Many of those who came forward said they had been waiting for years to have sufficient confidence in a team who seemed serious about tackling corruption.”
However, given the various revelations about its conduct, the question that emerged later about SPIT was whether the members were ever serious about tacking anything other than enjoying a jolly in the Caribbean at the local tax payers’ expense.
The alleged hours and hours of taped interview, which Bridger had said documented complaints about corruption and misconduct in the police and elsewhere, have never seen the light of day. The outcome of Operation Cealt, which was taken over by the current commissioner after Smith left, has never been revealed. John Evans has claimed that many of the complaints were questionable and had come from Desmond Seales, the Net News editor at the heart of the entire investigation, whom Evans suggests Bridger trusted throughout. Other sources close to the investigation have told CNS that the complaints made about corruption in the RCIPS had more to do with incompetence.
Bridger, it appears, has not given up on Operation Tempura and is implying that, rather than unravelling as a result of SPIT’s incompetence and a lack of evidence, the investigation was deliberately blocked. The impact of the fallout from SPIT was nowhere near as damaging for Bridger as it was for his colleague Polaine, who was struck off as a result of his involvement.
The former UK cop faired far better. He retired from the Metropolitan Police Service during his time here in the Cayman Islands and took up a consultancy post with the CIG as SIO of SPIT. According to an auditor general’s report, he earned more than $500,000 in salary, benefits and expenses, paid for by the Cayman tax-payer.
Police issue more warnings over text scammers
(CNS): Despite the endless warnings from the unit that emails and text messages telling people they have won cash prizes are just about always scams, Officers from the RCIPS Financial Crime Unit, along with local telecom firm Digicel and LIME are raising the alarm again about fraudulent texts. Cell phone users are being warned to be on the lookout for a text message that suggest they’ve won a cash prize which the police have pointed out is a scam. Customers throughout the Cayman Islands have reportedly been receiving fraudulent text messages from an unknown source saying they have won thousands in a promotion but Digicel and Lime say it is not connected to them.
“Legitimate text messages from the company are always accompanied by Digicel’s name or a four (4) digit number,” Digicel’s CEO Victor Corcoran said. “Our clients should never sending personal information, for example, bank details and addresses, to unknown or suspicious senders whether via text message or over the internet.”
Julie Hutton, Marketing Manager for LIME said the firm advises anyone who receivesa text that they are suspicious of to contact the call centre at 811. “All our promotional or informational texts come with the heading LIME. We also want to take this opportunity to remind people to be vigilant with regards to e-mails and never give out personal details including user names and passwords, LIME would never ask a customer for these details,” she added.
Sgt Michael Montaque from the FSU warned the public to watch out for all emails, faxes, text messages or letters that promise a large sum.
“Over the years, the stories used by fraudsters in these scams have become much more sophisticated and technologically advanced. There are a wide variety of scams circulating out there,” he said. “These communications will appear to come from legitimate companies. They can include company logos and addresses taken from the internet – all to make them look more legitimate and to persuade you to part with your banking details and money.
“Once you have responded with your bank details, the scammers may simply try to clean out your account. They might ask you to send them money to ‘release funds’ via money transfer. Or they may send you a fake cheque, asking you to cash it and send them a small amount to release the ‘rest of your winnings’.”
He pointed out that the best way to avoid becoming a victim is to never give out your bank details.
Further information about how to avoid becoming the victim of scams can be obtained by calling the RCIPS Financial Crime Unit on 949-8797. Digicel customers can call 100 from Digicel mobiles or 345-623-3444 from landlines for further information.
Jury pool needs to expand
(CNS): Chief Justice Anthony Smellie has backed the call by the legal profession to expand the Cayman Islands’ jury pool beyond the electoral register. The country’s top judge warned that law reform was by no means the only way to address the issue of rising crime as he offered his support to the idea of extending the roll of jurors to include all adults lawfully resident in the jurisdiction. He said penal or punitive measures could only go so far to protect the public interest and that legislation is not meant to be a panacea to crime. The CJ also revealed that the judiciary’s advice against moves by government to remove the right to trial by jury had been accepted.
Talking about the need for the community to be more engaged in the fight against crime during his address at the opening of the Grand Court, Smellie explained the advantages to be gained by widening the net when it came to jurors.
“If adopted, [it] would not only greatly increase the number of potential jurors it would also spread all the burdens and responsibilities of jury duty across that wider base,” the judge told the audience gathered at the court house for the official ceremony. “And it follows, there would be even less to be gained for those with criminal intentions in seeking to intimidate jurors, if they were assured that the society at large refuses to be intimidated.”
The difficulty of panelling juries is an ongoing problem in Cayman as a result of the relatively small jury pool and the family connections between people. In February last year the process of jury selection in one firearms related trial with four defendants resulted in the entire jury pool for that session being dismissed for one reason or another when only four people had been sworn to serve. The court staff were then forced to literally trawl the streets of George Town to find the remaining three jurors, and when one fell ill the trial went ahead with only six people sitting on the jury.
During jury selection it is common for those who are called to serve to reveal direct connections with the defendants, the victims, the witnesses or the police involved with the case. Coupled with the right of both the crown and the defence attorneys to refuse up to five juror’s each, it can take a long time to find seven people, and in the case of murder trials twelve people, who can honestly say they are completely impartial.
With the rise in crime in the local community, the chief justice said that legislative reform was not an uncommon response but he emphasized it was not the only response and called on the community to help. “No matter how draconian the measure, it can provide no substitute for the will of society itself at large to confront the problem of crime and for the responsibility of each and every law abiding citizen to do his or her part to assist the law enforcement authorities in the response to crime. Strength in numbers is the ultimate recourse of lawful society,” the top judge said.
Noting the dangers and limitations of law reform he pointed to a recent ruling in the Court of Appeal with regard to the crown’s use of the new witness anonymity law. The Court of Appeal had explained in the ruling “why such anonymity orders should only be made in exceptional circumstances and why a witness protection programme in Cayman is likely to have only limited practicability.”
He said taken as a whole, the raft of legislative changes told the story of a society that “perceives itself as faced with a crisis” and was using legislative means to respond.
“While such a response is understandable and even to be expected, the judicial perspective must nonetheless be objective as the legislative measures arise for interpretation, implementation and enforcement. And it is then that the realities that separate the expected benefits, from the practical limitations of this kind of legislation, are likely to be tested, explained and declared,” the judge warned.
Any perceived attempt to retreat behind a legislative cloak of protection could send the wrong message, Smellie added.
He also spoke of the need to tackle the rise in violent crime in alternative ways. Following the presentation from Attorney General Sam Bulgin, the chief justice said the early and continued intervention with young people at risk could do a lot more to address the issue than legislation alone.
Laws pave way for water sale
(CNS): With government having put out the country’s sewage project for tender last year, the deputy premier brought three bills to the Legislative Assembly this week that pave the way not just for privatisation of the Water Authority’s wastewater management system but the entire authority. The combination of new laws and amendments which deal with the production of water and concessions to provide it, wastewater collection and the management of the system were, Juliana O’Connor-Connolly said, “crafted with care” and allowed government to move to the “implementation mode of its wider policy for divestment of these assets.” Later in the debate, the premier revealed that his intention was to lease the water authority but offered no details of the plan.
The new laws brought by the minister with responsibility for the authority, Juliana O’Connor-Connolly, will ultimately mean an increase in costs for most people in the Cayman Islands. Everyone will be charged not just for the water they use in future but for the treatment of sewage as well. Under the new Wastewater Collection and Treatment Bill (2010), all buildings must be connected to the wastewater system, under whichever private organisation is eventually selected.
The three bills have been crafted to facilitate the sale of the government’s water company but during the debate on the legislation, which spanned across two days in the country’s parliament, the government did not reveal any of the details of how it intended to privatise or lease the Water Authority itself and to whom.
As he contributed to the debate on the third law, the Water Authority Amendment bill, the premier lashed out at the opposition for asking government to spell out those plans and said he needed money to run the country because of the previous administration’s mismanagement. He described the opposition as “evil” and said they were deliberately misinforming the country that there was something “nefarious” going on when he was trying to do something to improve the financial position of government.
Bush indirectly implied that civil servants had been leaking information to the opposition when he said they “knew too much” and accused people at “authorities”, whom he later said he had assisted to get their doctorates, as impeding government’s intention to realize the assets it had at a time when the country needed money.
Giving little away with regard to the plans for the actual authority itself, the premier was furious as he struck out at the opposition over their questions to government about the bills when he said people had been waste deep in sewage in Hurricane Ivan. He warned that if a visiting tourist were to catch any kind of gastric condition from swimming in Cayman waters, the country would seriously suffer.
During his attack on the opposition, which began on Monday evening and recommenced on Wednesday afternoon, the premier went no further in revealing what he intended to do with the authority other than saying it would be leased, not sold.
Alden McLaughlin had raised the point that the legislation seemed to be what he said was “purchaser-specific”, as though it had all been drawn from an existing checklist, and wondered if government already had someone in mind. “This is not being developed in a vacuum, with government looking to find the best possible arrangement,” he said, adding that he believed the laws were prepared in such a way to allow the purchaser to sign on the dotted line.
The opposition and Ezzard Miller, the independent member for North Side, who said he was against the privatisation, also raised the question of why the usual requirement under the law for Caymanians to have a 60/40 split with foreign entities for local companies was being waived, suggesting that Caymanians would be denied the opportunity to be involved.
Arden Mclean, the member for East End who was the former minister with responsibility for the authority, pointed out that the Water Authority was a profitable entity and he did not support its privatisation. He said that in 2008 it was valued at over $61 million.
“All I want to know is, if the people’s money is going to be used to make someone else money or are we getting that $61 million back right now?” he asked. McLean pointed out that over the years the government had reinvested the profits of the authority back in, so it was the people’s money which was used to allow the authority to be self-sufficient and keep the people’s water safe. “All of a sudden the Johnny-come-latelies are going to ride on their white horse and they are going to use the country’s money to make their own profit.”
The three bills were passed through a second reading and following a committee stage for any amendments to the legislation, which is expected to be passed in full by Friday.