Seven months after the case involving the Sacred Heart fire insurance scam was adjourned indefinitely, church officials are worried about its progress.
As time passes they are becoming increasing convinced that this “brazen” act which was hatched at a time when they had suffered a great loss, will go unpunished. The accused in the case, Dr. Fred Sukhdeo in the meantime is free on bail. It is alleged that on December 29, 2004, Sukhdeo, with intent to defraud forged a document purporting to be a GuyFlag fire and perils claim for US$2 million ($400 million) for the Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church. Sukhdeo is also accused of trying to obtain the said sum of money by virtue of a forged fire and perils claim form.
Roman Catholic Bishop of Guyana Francis Alleyne recently told Stabroek News that he is concerned about the delay in the prosecution of the case. “I am concerned that these perpetrators will not be brought to justice… Our church was chosen and they saw the fire as an opportunity. I was taken aback that someone would be so brazen to do something like this and get away with it”, Bishop Alleyne said.
He stated that it was following the fire that the bogus US$2 million GuyFlag insurance claim appeared. The Bishop explained to Stabroek News that the false document stated that the church had taken out the policy a year before the fire. It was sent to the claims adjustor following the fire and it was then that the fraud was unearthed.
During the interview, Bishop Alleyne expressed concern that if such a crime could have been committed on a church, “it could be happening to others”. Despite the fact that he was a prosecution witness, no one had contacted him about the case since.
While a plan has already been drawn for the new church, funds are presently being raised to get the construction underway. Bishop Alleyne could not say when the rebuilding would commence.
According to the facts of the case, GuyFlag submitted a bogus claim for payment to its reinsurance agent AON Re and Dr Sukhdeo, who was the head of the sister operation, the National Cooperative Credit Union Limited, was presented as a representative of the Catholic Church dealing with the Sacred Heart fire. However the Church was its own insurer. It was GuyFlag/Sukhdeo’s approach to the loss adjuster, Gregory Yeadon of Barbados that brought the matter to light, as Yeadon’s suspicions led him to the Roman Catholic Bishop who said there was no policy. Then Commissioner of Insurance, Maria van Beek, based on her analysis of the matter had subsequently refused to license GuyFlag as an insurance company, a decision which GuyFlag sought to challenge in court. She had also ordered it to cease writing new insurance business.
After a protracted police investigation, Dr. Sukhdeo was arrested almost a year later on November 17, 2005 and placed on $50,000 station bail. Following further police investigations he was charged in March 2006 and released on $75,000 bail.
The trial started sometime later but it had been hit by many adjournments causing a delay in its progression.
In one instance there was an adjournment when the magistrate announced that she was giving priority to a narcotics matter since the defendants in the matter were on remand. Then, another date was given when none of Sukhdeo’s two lawyers turned up. The no show of witnesses was also a problem for the prosecution over the years.
Last November things took a turn when the prosecution requested that the matter be put down sine die (indefinitely) so that a key witness (Yeadon) who is based in Barbados could be brought.
Magistrate Hazel Octive-Hamilton who has been handling the trial granted the request. The last time evidence was given was eight months prior to this development and during the subsequent hearings, the prosecution never indicated that they were having difficulties locating this key witness.
Special Prosecutor
Bishop Alleyne told Stabroek News that there were two “competent” lawyers – Nigel Hughes and Gino Persaud who have been offering advice. They told him, he said, that the case was very technical and the police were not equipped to handle it. It was based on this he said that the two attorneys applied to the DPP’s Chambers for private prosecution which he, Bishop Alleyne, did not see as an unreasonable request.
He recalled that there was an acknowledgement to a letter sent to the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) Shalimar Ali-Hack and after hearing nothing further, a second letter was sent. According to Bishop Alleyne, the letters were sent months apart.
“The lawyers were filling me in on the ins and outs of the law…They said that (applying for special prosecution) was the only avenue. The lawyers said that they had exhausted their options”, he noted.
Meanwhile, in adding his views on the issue, Persaud said that he was never officially on record in the Sacred Heart case since the DPP “neglected, omitted, failed and/or refused to consider a written request by the Roman Catholic Bishop of Guyana for Nigel Hughes and myself to be appointed special prosecutors”.
Persaud said that given the reluctance to appoint special prosecutors (at no expense to the State), he hoped that the DPP would have delegated a Senior State Prosecutor to take over the prosecution from the police.
“In my view it is not too late. A State Counsel can still be appointed who can then make contact with the witness from Barbados to make himself available to give testimony in Guyana. I never understood the reluctance to appoint special prosecutors. I have come across numerous instances where special prosecutors were appointed for far more trivial offences”, he stressed.
He expressed his personal disappointment, that a request by “a person of high moral authority such as the Roman Catholic Bishop was ignored and did not even seem to merit a response” from the DPP.
According to the lawyer, the delay in prosecuting such a high profile fraud case is indeed unfortunate.
Stabroek News was informed by the attorney that there was a statement submitted by the key police witness (Yeadon) which implicated several persons. Despite the fact that he is a critical and material witness, he has not been called to give evidence though the case has been before the court for several years.
“We were informed that Yeadon had previously stated that he was more than willing to give evidence in court but he was never contacted by the prosecution to do so. I do not know if he is still willing” Persaud said.
He later told this newspaper that from the first day of the trial it was patently obvious that the police prosecutor did not read the file and was ill-prepared. The evidence-in-chief which the prosecutor led was an “absolute disaster”, he pointed out.
This newspaper called the DPP’s chambers on two occasions but was told that the DPP was on leave. During the first call, after being given an explanation on what information was required, this newspaper was told that Ali-Hack was on vacation leave and the deputy DPP was not in a position to comment on the matter.
