Family wants ‘frozen’ money from State to bury drug lord

RELATIVES of Mantoor Ramdhanie want the State to release his body to them as well as a portion of his seized assets so they can give the 59-year-old convicted drug dealer a funeral.

Ramdhanie, who was sentenced to life imprisonment eight years ago, took in ill at the Frederick Street, Port-of-Spain prison on Wednesday and died on Thursday at hospital. News of his death caused his wife at Icacos Village to fall ill. She had to seek medical attention. Ramdhanie has one daughter and two of his three sons live abroad. The other son, Deochan, is serving a life sentence along with two other men for the same offence Ramdhanie was convicted for in 1996 — drug trafficking. A wake is being held at the Icacos home but tomorrow, attorneys for the Ramdhanie family of Icacos Village, will file a summons in the High Court for the State to release a portion of the $3.3 million confiscated by the State from the drug dealer’s assets. Already, attorneys at Lincoln Chambers, Port-of-Spain, have written to the DPP Geoffrey Henderson on the matter. They have dispatched a letter to the Commissioner of Prisons requesting that Ramdhanie’s body be released to his wife and four children. Except for a person on Death Row, a prisoner who dies in prison is given a pauper’s funeral if his or her body is not claimed by relatives. The summons to be filed on behalf of one of Ramdhanie’s children will seek to have the State release $15,000 from the seized $3.3 million assets under the Confiscation of Property Act.

Ramdhanie died just two days after the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in England granted him leave to appeal his life sentence. Lord Hutton, leading a panel of two other judges, granted Ramdhanie leave on Monday morning. Their Lordships granted leave only on three of the 17 grounds filed by attorneys of Lincoln Chambers. Contacted yesterday, attorney Mark Seepersad of Lincoln Chambers, said that it was only yesterday he was able to reach Ramdhanie’s attorneys in England to break the news of his death. They are British QC Edwards Fitzgerald and Dr Charles Seepersad. The State was represented by British QC Peter Knox. Seepersad (Mark) said Ramdhanie’s son, Deochan, who is incarcerated at the Maximum State Prison (MSP) in Arouca, was only informed about his father’s death late yesterday. Senior prison officers told Sunday Newsday yesterday that no arrangements had been put in place up to late yesterday for Deochan to view his father’s body. Since Deochan’s escape from the Princes Town Magistrate’s Court in 1998 to the Venezuelan mainland, security had been tight around the cell block area at the MSP where he stays.

Seepersad said a letter has been sent to Minister of National Security Howard Chin Lee and the Prison Commissioner requesting that Deochan be given the opportunity to view his father’s body and also attend the funeral. Ramdhanie two other sons who live abroad, Seepersad said, are planning on returning to Trinidad to give their father a funeral according to Hindu rites. Ramdhanie, son Deochan, Patrick Toolsie and Ken Gresham were convicted for drug trafficking in 1996 by a jury and sentenced by Justice Stanley John to life imprisonment. The judge ordered that they not be released until after 20 years. Subsequent to their jailing under newly enacted legislation (Confiscation of Property Act), the State seized a total of $5.5 million worth of assets belonging to the four accused men. Seepersad said that he spoke to Ramdhanie as recent as Monday about his appeal in the Privy Council. Ramdhanie, he added, pleaded with him to secure bail for him, principally because he was extremely ill. He had suffered two stokes, was chronically diabetic and ailing from high blood pressure. Ramdhanie also had a heart condition. Three applications were made in court on Ramdhanie’s behalf for bail but all were refused.

Yesterday, relatives who spoke on anonymity, said they were dissatified with the treatment meted out to the ailing Ramdhanie at the prison. Seepersad took issue with the fact that Ramdhanie was kept at the Frederick Street prison while son Deochan was incarcerated at the MSP. “As to why an ailing prisoner was not kept at MSP where there are better facilities, the authorities have not answered,” Seepersad said. The attorney said that on Monday last, relatives were forced to purchase medication for Ramdhanie because a prescription lodged at the prison several days had not been filled. Ramdhanie was rushed to the Port-of-Spain General Hospital on Wednesday when he fell ill.