Betrayal of public trust

OFFICERS in the public service who betray their positions of trust for personal gain are unfortunate figures indeed. In choosing a job or career that involves service to the public they must recognise not only the humanitarian aspects of their duties but also the need to operate at the highest standards of honesty and impartiality. When they fail to maintain these standards, when they abuse their positions by engaging in different forms of corruption, they not only demean themselves but also undermine the system that serves the wider public, quite often those most in need.

It becomes necessary, then, to deal in an exemplary way with those public servants, at whatever level, who fraudulently appropriate to themselves funds intended for special sections of the population such as pensioners or for those to whom the money is owing. No one should question then the jailing of two former postmistresses within the last month who have been found guilty of stealing money passing through their respective offices. On Monday, Gloria Ramnarine was sentenced to six and a half years in prison by Justice Malcolm Holdip in the San Fernando High Court for stealing $145,000 from the safe of the Rio Claro Post Office. Earlier this month, Tara Sankersingh was found guilty of fraudulently signing and cashing 12 cheques posted out to dead pensioners at Palo Seco. Justice Mark Mohammed in the San Fernando High Court imposed sentences amounting to 89 years on  Sankersingh but, because they are to run concurrently, she will eventually serve seven years in jail.

Both judges were firm in their condemnation of this form of corruption and expressed the need to send a strong message to those who may be tempted to commit similar offences. Justice Holdipp noted that the case before him was “lamentable but it is not, unfortunately, an unusual one.” In delivering sentence, he quoted from a British Appeal Court judge, saying: “The courts have to deal sternly with those who abuse trust at the expense of others. The seriousness with which the court has to view any individual case depends, of course, upon the facts of it. The greater the abuse of trust implicitly placed in such a person as a postmistress, the greater the need to punish severely and thereby to deter others from being tempted to behave in that way.”

In Sankersingh’s case, Justice Mohammed felt a message had to be sent to others “who may be tempted to tinker with the public purse made up in many cases from hard-earned tax dollars.” He noted that the forgery of pensioners signatures was part of a “well planned and executed scheme” which might gone unnoticed if not for an unexpected audit conducted at the Palo Seco post office. The judge told Sankersingh: “People of this country reposed faith in your ability to handle with honesty a substantial sum of money and other stocks which were placed in your charge. You betrayed that trust in a very serious manner.” In our view, these are two cases of public servants who were led astray by their own greed. Was their ill-gotten gains worth the punishment they must now serve and the personal humiliation they must suffer, perhaps for the rest of their lives? We think not. The lesson they send to all those persons employed to serve the public should be painfully clear.