Tempura boss battles AG
(CNS): The discredited UK investigation into alleged corruption in the RCIPS is still costing the public purse. The Attorney General’s Chambers is currently running up more legal fees as it engages in a legal battle with Martin Bridger, the former senior investigating officer of Operation Tempura, over the use of documents from the much maligned police probe. Bridger is battling with the Cayman authorities regarding the use of documents that were gathered during the two year plus enquiry. However, the details of the civil dispute remain under wraps as the trial, which began Tuesday, is continuing behind closed doors with the public and media barred from observing the latest chapter in the fall-out from Tempura.
The controversial internal police probe began in 2008 as a result of an alleged corrupt relationship between Deputy Police Commissioner Anthony Ennis and the late Desmond Seales, who owned the local news publication, Cayman Net News. The investigation took many twists and turns and involved the unlawful arrest of a Grand Court judge, who was awarded significant damages, allegations of burglary, as well as the sacking of the police commissioner at the time, Stuart Kernohan, among others. It has cost the public purse in excessive of more than $10 million but no charges of corruption were ever successfully filed against anyone.
Since then, the fallout from the enquiry has continued to plague the police and authorities as law suits, various complaints and allegations have flown between the relevant players, including senior investigating officer Martin Bridger.
CNS understands that the current trial involves the attorney general’s attempt to prevent Bridger from exposing records that he has in his possession from the investigation that the former Scotland Yard cop is threatening to expose in connection with his own complaints and Kernohan’s law suit.
It is understood that the RCIPS does not hold all of the records from the initial investigations and many documents were retained by Bridger. These are believed to include sensitive information, such as other allegations so far unrevealed, statements from witnesses, phone records and other files.
The AG is now spending more public cash in order to prevent the content of those records reaching the public domain.
Category: Crime
Bridger’s Visa for entry should be revoked.
Too late, I just saw him in the BA check out line getting ready to fly home.
Was he wearing his ducky float ring?
Folks, the reasons why much of this investigation is still under wraps and secret is the nature of the evidence they found.
Exactly!! No-one wants to think about that though………….
No, it's exactly the opposite.
The reason information from Tempura and Cealt is being kept secret is because making it public would reveal that the people of the Cayman Islands paid out a heck of lot of money (right now I reckon around it's CI$30million and there's a lot more to come) on an investigation that turned up absolutely nothing worthwhile. A lot of that money either went into the pockets of private consultants or had to be paid out as a result of their questionable conduct.
If you look at the efforts that were made to interfere with Dan Duguay's 2009 audit – some of the documents are in the CNS Library – you start to understand where the cover up was coming from and why it was happening.
This investigation was launched on 3 September 2007 with the full support of some very senior FCO officials and they are going to look extremely silly if any of the real facts about what went on are ever made public.
This is simply 'CYA and hope it all goes away' time at the FCO.
Mr. Evans:
Where there is smoke there is fire. Maybe they couldn't get concrete evidence because we all know how much evidence disappears. One of my family members were a victim of this and justice was never served.
What are you hoping to get out of this?
I want to find out where all the money went and why people involved in these investigations apparently got away with some very interesting (I can't use the word I want to for legal reasons) tactics without anyone doing anything about it.
I am only too well aware that Tempura/Cealt selectively processed some of the reports made to them because several well-documented complaints made to Net News were passed on but were definitely never investigated, although one of the officers concerned has since been retired.
I'd suggest your family member starts talking to the media because as far as I can see there's plenty of interest in reporting wrongdoing right now.
Keeping it quiet and hiding behind anonymity just gives the impression this is all the Marl Road at work and that right now is one of the biggest problems – plenty talk but not much else. To use your own words – loads of smoke but no fire. Let's start lighting the fire.
The last sentence says a lot about!
Sorry to break it to you Nabolsi but there is something much more powerful than the Lodge; it's called the wig wearers or the legal profession. They make the Lodge look like a day care.
Let us be honest with ourselves with huge amount of secrecy that surround this whole matter could only mean one thing, that those involved are in the Lodge and that has always been the real problem from the very get go.
As a member of several lodges I find the various findings laughable. The members of all lodges have nothing to do with this fiasco.
The Lodge /Gov. officials/ senior civil servants are all the same "dog/puppy".
so say you…if the lodges were transparent and open we would know for sure, wouldn't we.??
Mr. AG …. let it go man. This rubbish has already cost me and the country too much money for absolutely nothing.
Stop wasting more money, it will do us all good if ALL the information connected to this fiasco is made public. I for one want to see anything that is available from something that cost us $12 million
Hmmmmm.Very Interesting………Missing Desmond Seales right about now.
Thought all this was finished with. By the way did Burmon get his money as yet, or he will get nothing for all that he went through?
Please explain the legal basis he is entitled to money other than his legal costs?
There is not one. They always come on CNS bleating about this.
The same legal basis that was used to pay the judge and the others.
Not sure what that was, but I believe it was false arrest and damage to reputation…
Except the Henderson case involved an established tort committed against him. Which makes all the difference. Just because a jury, a Cayman jury, does not consider that the prosecution have proved beyond reasonable doubt that the necessary elements of the crime in the indictment have been proved does not give rise to any right to compensation nor should it. The only thing established by an acquittal is simply that the jury have considered that the evidence presented at trial did not permit a conviction, nothing else is established.
Burmon never went to court. Where are you trying to go with this?
As I understand it, the basis for the claim in which compensation was awarded involved special issues relating to the status of judges and the definition of contempt of court in Cayman. These issues did not apply to a police officer.
To conclude, don't go after a judge unless you have dotted all of your "i's" and crossed all of your "t's". Simple.
We the people of Cayman need to know what they are hidding from us. Failing that, the UK should pay the billls,
Like a bad rash!
Why won’t you just go away!
Giving the corrupt the power to corrupt and then turning around and accusing them of being corrupt so you can justify your actions to stop and eliminate corruption what interesting games we play in these territories eh actually benefiting from it strategically and financial political via jobs and employment for the boys now that takes balls. When we watch the lazy and incompetent and corrupt being promoted and elevated to powerful positions we complained how can this be, we were told to do your duty. When we warned them about what was happening they told us to comply not complain. When we told them the truth about what happen they told us to keep quiet they are going to fix it. They never did not tell us fools when or how they were going to fix it now did they? Those locals, boy dey fool bad eh?
Cayman can teach most of the world about secrecy in legal proceedings.
So not only are Cayman's top cops getting screwed here in Cayman, Brit/Cay's top cops have suffered the same.
Lets see how much he is awared to remain mum. Its going to cost us a pretty sum.
Better the truth come out than believe that all are unworthy.
What would be the harm to make these documents know to the public ?
Is there something that needs to kept hidden, Mr. premier ?
Why you have to tie the Premier to this? lets stop the sick man's backside rhetoric!
It's defamatory. ; < )
What ever happened to the government's commitment to transparency?
Why all the secrecy? It is our money, even if the British thinks it's theirs. We all know how this will end up ..the people of Cayman will get screwed once again and some Englishman will walk away with millions of dollars and we will be given no explanation other that we have to pay him.
If we are paying for it then it should be open to the public!
If we believe what the those in power say about Tempura why is so much time, money effort being spent to hide the truth from us the public? simple enough question. We demand truth since we are allegedly paying to defend it.
That is interesting because I understood this was supposed to be an open hearing.
Just to fill in a few gaps. Thanks to an FOI request to RCIPS last year I discovered that all the records from the early Tempura investigations, in which I was involved, had been officially transferred to the Met in the UK. The only problem was that they never arrived there and further requests to the Met have confirmed this.
Who now actually holds the records in unclear, as is the legal status of the documents in relation to the various contracts that were entered into during Operations Tempura and Cealt. What is clear is that some of the contents of the complaint filed by Martin Polaine in 2010 and dismissed in March 2011 by a still secret 185-page, CI$335K report that was commissioned by Duncan Taylor were probably based on that material.
The legal argument referred to in this story has already been to court in the UK and the AG lost. A normally reliable source tells me this action alone has cost the people of the Cayman Islands around CI$400K.
The real question here is how this extremely sensitive material was allowed to go walkabout in the first place and whether its removal from the Cayman Islands was lawful. As far as I understand it this includes the identities of everyone who co-operated with, or filed complaints to, Operations Tempura and Cealt up until April 2009 when Martin Bridger was replaced by Anne Lawrence. As one of Mr Bridger's investigators was still involved in all this in September 2009 it may (and for legal reasons I emphasise MAY!) even include material from later dates.
One aspect that I still haven't been able to investigate in the UK are the implications of the Data Protection Act, which controls the storage and use of personal information in any format. The only reason that hasn't happened is because right now the identity of the person or organisation actually holding the records cannot be accurately established. That is one of the reasons why I was hoping this would be an open hearing and look forward to any updates.
Ironically, I was due to meet with Henry Bellingham to discuss all this on 11 September but the meeting has been postponed to let Mark Simmonds get established in post as the new OT Minister. Hopefully, we will get this re-scheduled in the near future.
In the meantime this on-going legal fight simply reinforces my arguments for either a re-audit of Tempura/Cealt or a public inquiry (which I believe should be funded by the FCO) to find out where all the money went and what went wrong.
The documents have been sent to the paper equivalent of Guantanamo Bay.
"…how this extremely sensitive material was allowed to go walkabout…"
It appears possible, just possible mind you, that the cancerous corruption goes fairly high.
If mere minions were involved, their heads would be on stakes in front of the courthouse (figuratively, of course).
Trust me if it wasn't for the fact that those I would like to name as involved in all this are well 'lawyered up' and just looking for an excuse to start throwing writs around some fairly important people would be reading their names in these comments. All I will say is that no members of the judiciary and no politicians, past or present, are involved although a possible contender in next year's elections might be.
The problem is that I'm 5000 miles away and safely in a position where trying to litigate against me would be a bit like relieving yourself into a Nor'wester but others are not so fortunate.
It's case of money talks here and until the Governor gets off the fence and does the job he's being paid to do those involved (and by now must know who they are) will get away with what they've done.
A problem we have is that the RCIP is divded into two.
A branch for the FCO and a little portion for the local enforcement matters
like a local politician said, quite rightly on the radio a while back – the FCO has so many spies here its not funny.
In just the last budget the RCIP bought $4million dollars worth of SPY EQUIPMENT.
I don't think it's ever been any secret that many people accredited to the FCO are actually members of the security services in the same way that officers from the CIA, Mossad, FSB (former KGB) and all the other national security organisations are badged as 'diplomats' when working overseas.
What makes things really complicated for the Cayman Islands is the well-documented use of offshore bank accounts (I think Brian Gibbs and BCCI is possibly the most notable example) by organisations like MI6. Are we going through another scandal like that? Is that why everything is being kept under wraps?
The truth is a snare, you cannot have it without being caught by it, you cannot have the truth in such away that you catch it that it doesn't catch you. There are three things you cannot hide the sun the moon and the truth. This matter will never go away and continue to plague these islands until the people are told the entire truth about Tempura no matter how offensive it is and those in our government who are blockin and obstucting this obviously in fear of the truth! and truth is a dangerous enemy of the corruption.
So the AG is afraid of the sanitizing light of day reaching this debacle. Pray tell why would that be? The tip of the iceberg is all that we can see, but it is there. Tear down the wall and let the chips fall where they may. This is the one and only way for Cayman to survive.
what's the fuss, not really different from anything else that's currently going on in Govt.
You know, I cannot help wondering how much of the "discredit" is down to the UK cops being inept, and how much is down to certain political leaders who came under investigation during Tempura doing their utmost to obstruct, deflect and discredit the investigation.
Not that ANY of our political leaders would do such a thing. Maybe I am just suspicious of our leaders motives when faced with such an investigation. Can we be sure they behaved properly when faced with an investigation, however inept it might have been?
I think if you go back through Hansard you'll get the answers to some of this.
The Tempura/Cealt fiasco was debated in the LA more than once and people's feelings about it are on record but, based on the Aina report, there was no political interference.
In fact it could be argued that for a long time just the opposite was true. During almost the whole of first two years of the investigation Tempura/Cealt was given a proverbial 'blank cheque' by CIG and nothing was properly monitored or checked until Dan Duguay tried to conduct an audit in March/April 2009. At this point well-documented attempts were made to frustrate the work of the OAG and, as we now know, the aim of that interference was, with some success, to cover up exactly what was going on. Thanks to FOI, and some notable honesty by the Metropolitan Police, some of the gaps in Mr Duguay's audit have now been filled but it isn't over by a long way.
Does it not strike you as very strange that a private contractor (because from some time in April 2008 to the end of April 2009 that's what the people running Tempura were) should take it on themselves to remove all the records of a very sensitive police investigation then selectively try to use some of them for their own purposes several years later?
The problem with this whole mess is that too many questions remain unanswered. As just one example – in 2008, at a time when Tempura was in danger of sinking without trace, Martin Bridger met with a select group of MLAs (I know who two of them were) and apparently told them that he was working on evidence that RCIPS officers had been involved in drug dealing and murder. That applied just the right kind of pressure required to force MLAs who were critical of the costs (remember the SIO was on £787 – about CI$1200 at the time – a day) to back off. If that claim was true (and I don't think it was) any records of this have now, rather conveniently, disappeared.
According to sources in the UK, where this is being watched with quite a lot of interest, the issue over the documents relates to both ownership and alleged mis-use of the contents. It's not about keeping them secret because they are, by definition, confidential records and contain information supplied in confidence.
'…….that RCIPS officers had been involved in drug dealing and murder.'
Don't know about murder but isn't involved in drug dealing and other unlawful activities well-known amongst the RCIP?
Secret trials, how typically British.
Either an ignorant or sarcastic comment. Very few UK trials are held in secret and information is much more freely available in UK than here. And UK is generally transparent. Wish we could say the same here…
Ask the Irish about the British injustice.
But remember to ask them first about bombing and murdering that lead to that period.
All will come to light, don't worry…………………. yet.
Well said Mr Anonymous.
Oh I agree.
And by comparison… Cayman is soooo transparant.
Why are secret trials typically British? Name one? More eastern European I think.
More money to be paid out and more documents secetly held.
A tad late in the day! Why is the AG only now reacting to Bridger's threats instead of being proactive and taking action to prevent disclosure long ago? One would think that any quick thinking attorney would have done that.