The US$2 million Sacred Heart Church insurance scam case was yesterday adjourned for a week after the court was informed that a Constitutional Motion in the High Court which sought to prohibit criminal prosecution in the lower court, was scheduled to be heard later in the day.
At yesterday’s hearing before Magistrate Hazel Octive Hamilton, the accused Frederick Sukhdeo was present. His lawyer, Sanjeev Datadin however was absent.
The magistrate indicated that the motion was scheduled to be heard at 11 am and as such she would adjourn the case until next Wednesday.
Earlier this month Sukhdeo, through lawyers Sir Fenton Ramsahoye and Datadin contended that the current proceedings are unlawful as they were restarted without legal authority or his knowledge and he is seeking a refund of forfeited bail as well as damages.
According to the Notice of Motion, Sukhdeo is seeking from Attorney General (AG) Anil Nandlall, who is listed as the respondent, compensation and/or damages including vindicatory award in response to the proceeding being conducted in the Georgetown Magistrate’s Court; repayment of $75,000 “being bail money unlawfully forfeited by the magistrate in the said proceedings”; and an order prohibiting the magistrate from further prosecution and hearing of the criminal proceedings, “which the magistrate purported to resume without lawful authority following the unlawful continuance of the proceedings sine die at a magisterial hearing.”
He is also seeking declarations that the discontinuance of the hearing by a purported adjournment and/or postponement sine die and the purported resumption thereof without notice to him or at all was beyond the statutory powers vested in the magistrate on the summary trial of two offences charged; that the continuance of the proceedings is unlawful for being conducted without jurisdiction; and that the state, represented by the AG, is liable to pay all sums awarded in these proceedings to him in respect of the conduct of the magistrate. Since the case started in 2006, there have been numerous objections.
Sukhdeo is accused of being the mastermind behind the insurance scam after the Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church was destroyed by fire on Christmas Day, 2004. It was 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 church. Sukhdeo was also accused of trying to obtain the said sum of money by virtue of a forged fire and perils claim form.
According to the prosecution’s case, GuyFlag submitted a bogus claim for payment to its reinsurance agent AON Re and Sukhdeo, who was the head of the sister operation, the National Cooperative Credit Union Limited, was presented as a representative of the church dealing with the fire. It was Yeadon who allegedly brought the scam to light. Sukhdeo was arrested on November 17, 2005 and placed on $50,000 station bail.
