SAN Juan police were up to late evening questioning a man and a woman about the disappearance of several dresses from well-known local designer, Heather Jones.

Police said a 45-year-old man was held at his Morvant home Thursday evening after he allegedly sold one of the dresses to a relative of Jones in Port-of-Spain. Recognising the dress, police said the relative contacted Jones, who immediately made a report to officers of the San Juan Criminal Investigations Department (CID). Based on information received, police said a 25-year-old woman was later arrested at her San Juan home by police, including PCs Aslim Hosein and Michelle Weekes.  The duo had not been charged up to late evening and police said the two were well known to Jones. According to the police, approximately 100 dresses, priced between $1,500 and $2,000 were stolen in batches between January to April from Jones’ businessplace situated at Third Avenue, Barataria.

Police said some of the dresses began surfacing at the Point Fortin Borough Day celebrations, and were being sold at $200. Someone close to Jones recognised the dresses and then informed the designer about it.  Police said Jones was extremely shocked when told. Other dresses were also being sold in Port-of-Spain for similar prices. However, it was only on Thursday that Jones started to put the pieces together when she was informed by her relative.  When contacted yesterday, Jones told Newsday that there appeared to be a “ring involvement.” The designer did not want to say more, but stated that the dresses were stolen over a period of time. Another female employee said they were all shocked at the number of dresses stolen.  Investigations are continuing.

A PRINCES TOWN man and his common-law-wife managed to survive after they were buried in the rubble of their house which collapsed while they were sleeping on Thursday night. It took five men, 30 minutes to free Melina Cooper, 38, and Jimmy Span, 42, from under the rubble. They suffered only minor injuries.

Cooper’s sister, Geraldine, 40, and her three children, Junior, 19, Wendy, four, and Winston, three, were also asleep in the front bedroom of the wooden/concrete house when it collapsed. Fortunately for them their bedroom and the porch were the only parts of the house left standing. The owner of the house, Horace Hodge, died two years ago. When Newsday visited yesterday Cooper and her husband locked themselves in the remaining bedroom and refused to come out. Speaking through a space in the door, Span said: “We was sleeping and we end up on the ground. But we alright.”        
   
Geraldine Cooper, who was late yesterday seeking shelter for herself and her three children, recalled that they were asleep on the same bed, when she was awaken by a loud noise.      “My oldest son shouted, ‘Mammy the house fall down’, and I started to call my sister,” she said. The unemployed woman said when she opened her door and saw that the rest of her house had collapsed she called out to the neighbours for help “My sister was bawling for help, saying that she can’t take the pain no more. She was buried under big pieces of concrete and pieces of wood. Only she head was outside,” she said. Cooper said her sister suffered a sprained ankle and bruises on her hip, while Span got a blow to his chest. She said her two youngest children went to school yesterday, but were not sure to have a place to sleep when they returned yesterday evening. Cooper said she depends on neighbours to help her with meals, adding that whatever food stuff she had was somewhere in the rubble.

A neighbour, Merle Clarke, 44, said she was asleep when she heard the crashing sound. Clarke said when she rushed to the house she saw the two children standing in the gallery. She said she took them up and carried them to her home. Clarke made an appeal to the public to assist Cooper and her three children, adding that she was willing to help them in anyway she could. Meanwhile, in another housing disaster, a 75-year-old pensioner was left homeless on Wednesday when a demolition crew destroyed her Princes Town home. However, 75-year-old Vera Rauseo promised yesterday that she would not let the matter rest.  The three bedroom house at 48 Craignish Road, Princes Town had been in the family for more than 70 years, she said, but a man is claiming otherwise.

FOUR foreigners and one national were attacked at gunpoint Thursday night. Shortly after,one of the foreigners was later kidnapped by three armed and masked men who stormed a house at Darcy Road, Second Boissierre, Maraval, police sources told Newsday yesterday.

Up to late evening, however, the whereabouts of 60-year-old Venezuelan businessman Jose Jesus Bomparte Cipriani were unknown and the people who snatched and carried him off are yet to make a ransom demand. American national Jerry Johnson was relieved of $1,500 cash, Venezuelan Caroline Heyen was robbed of her handbag containing personal documents, including a return plane ticket to her homeland, while Trinidadian Martin Schneider had his cellphone stolen. Johnson’s South African wife Marion Johnson and Scottish-born David McDowell were also in the house at the time of the robbery and kidnapping. However, they were not robbed. 

The American Jerry Johnson, wife Marion, and McDowell live and work in Maracaibo, Venezuela, police revealed.  The four non-nationals came to Trinidad Tuesday and were due to leave yesterday. Police reports are that around 10.30 pm Thursday, Cipriani was sitting in the living room of the large two-storey house, owned by Schneider. Police said the three armed men jumped the front wall and a back gate, before entering the house. The armed men subsequently robbed Johnson (Jerry), Venezuelan Heyen, and Schneider then snatched Cipriani and escaped. A report was made and a party of officers from the St Clair Criminal Investigations Department (CID) under Insp Thorpe, arrived on the scene. At the Maraval house yesterday, Marion Johnson told Newsday that they were all at the house when the three men jumped the wall and the gate.

“They all had guns and he (Cipriani) was sitting on a chair,” the woman said, gesticulating.  She said the armed men also told them to “be quiet.” Marion Johnson said she could not say why anyone would want to snatch Cipriani, but disclosed that he had several businesses in Venezuela, and that they came to this country to shop. Police, meanwhile, said they received no leads up to late evening, but they were working along certain lines. Cpl Dennis and members of the AKS are continuing investigations.

OPPOSITION LEADER Basdeo Panday appeared to blow hot and cold towards the presiding officers of Parliament, Dr Linda Baboolal and Barry Sinanan, when he attended a luncheon for visiting Botswana President Festus Mogae at President’s House yesterday. Arriving virtually unnoticed around 1 pm, Panday promptly started to mingle with the assembled guests, one of whom was Baboolal.  The Senate President did not seem to need protection from the large contingent of Government Ministers encircling her as she chatted cordially with Panday for considerable lengths of time.

However Sinanan was not as fortunate as Baboolal to experience the Opposition Leader’s legendary charm with Panday turning and speaking to other persons even when the two men had their backs to one another. Prior to going to lunch, neither man spoke to one another. Panday was also observed in keen conversation with the Prime Minister, Attorney-General Glenda Morean, Education Minister Hazel Manning and Erica Williams-Connell, daughter of the country’s first Prime Minister Dr Eric Williams. The guest list for yesterday’s luncheon included a wide cross-section of persons from the political, judicial, educational and business spheres and members of the diplomatic corps.

Among those present were Chief Justice Sat Sharma, Tobago House of Assembly Chief Secretary Orville London, Central Bank Governor Ewart Williams, UWI Pro-Vice Chancellor Dr Bhoe Tewarie, Port-of-Spain Mayor Murchison Browne, San Fernando Mayor Gerard Ferreira and Government Ministers Danny Montano, Eric Williams, Joan Yuille-Williams, Christine Sahadeo, Diane Seukeran and Pennelope Beckles. On Thursday, Prime Minister Patrick Manning told a post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall that the UNC’s attacks against Sinanan and Baboolal were because they were East Indians. Asked how the Government would protect them, Manning reminded reporters that the PNM had a clear majority in the Lower House and a not-so clear majority in the Senate. He added that if necessary, Government would use its numerical strength to protect Sinanan and Baboolal.

JAMAAT AL Muslimeen leader Yasin Abu Bakr has secured a single digit number for his brand new, Nissan Maxima. The car was licensed last Friday and was given the number PBT 4. The number of the official vehicle of the Minister of National Security is PAO 4.

Sources at Licensing Authority told Newsday single digit numbers are reserved for Ministers, Members of Parliament and persons associated with them. The sources also stated that if someone wished, they could approach the Transport Commissioner directly for such a number but all such requests must be approved by the Transport Commissioner. Newsday sought to get an explanation on how Bakr was able to get such a number but was told the Transport Commissioner was not at work yesterday.

In a statement which challenged statements made by Attorney General Glenda Morean, FW Oil stated yesterday  that it did not allege that a former Minister of the Government requested any payment from the company in return for a contract to develop the Soldado oil field. In a release issued last night, the company stressed  that its US $100 lawsuit against the Government was based on the “wrongful” termination of the tender contract for the development of the Soldado field, which it claimed was contrary to the terms of the contract, the laws of Trinidad and Tobago and the bilateral investment treaty between Trinidad and Tobago and the United States.

“The claim is not based on any allegation regarding a request for ‘improper consideration’ by a former Minister, the company noted,  adding that some of the statements made by Morean on Thursday were “unfortunately, inaccurate.” The company said it had tried “almost continuously” to resolve this problem through “constructive negotiations” with the Government, but it was unable to start “a meaningful dialogue.” As a result it was forced to seek international arbitration at the World Bank to protect its interests. It added that FW Oil remained committed to bring the Soldado Fields back on-line as soon as possible.  The company noted that the Government had spent substantial sums on lawyers and investigators and was now bringing in yet another team of investigators, following the insolvency of the original investigators, the London-based ISS, “whose inaccurate reports were leaked to the press in December 2000.”

Meanwhile the United National Congress (UNC) yesterday scoffed at the claims that a former government minister and officials of State-oil company Petrotrin tried to bribe the international oil company  in 2000. UNC chairman Wade Mark said the issue was nothing but a People’s National Movement (PNM) diversionary tactic for the July 14 Local Government Elections and the Government was “collectively chasing after windmills.” “There is nothing to substantiate those allegations,” he declared. Mark added that if there was evidence of wrongdoing in the Soldado affair, Government should bring those culpable to justice.

Addressing a post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall, Attorney-General Glenda Morean said the company, was alleging, among other things, that a request for an improper payment was made by a former minister and officials of Petrotrin and that Government had hired London lawyers to investigate these and other claims. The UNC chairman said Morean’s  priorities were misplaced and the AG “should pre-ocupy herself” with obtaining Canadian forensic investigator Bob Lindquist’s final report on alleged corruption at the Water and Sewerage Authority  (WASA). Mark said as far as he was aware the AG has not received Lindquist’s report. Mark alleged that Morean raised the Soldado issue to divert public attention away from WASA Waterfarms issue.

“Baseless, groundless, stupid and ludicrous.”

That was how UNC’s Chairman and Leader of Opposition business in the Senate, Wade Mark yesterday described statements by Prime Minister Patrick Manning that the UNC was relentless attacking House Speaker Barry Sinanan and Senate President Linda Baboolal because they were East Indian. Manning said the UNC  was  targetting  East Indians in the PNM. But Mark stated that the UNC had nothing personal against Sinanan or Baboolal nor were they criticising them because of their race. “They could have been African, Chinese, Portuguese (it would still be the same).

What we are saying is that people who preside in the Parliament, should resign from their party position,” he said. He added that it was the UNC’s understanding that both Sinanan and Baboolal were not only card carrying members of the PNM, but also were paying five per cent of their salaries to the party (as dues which all legislators are required to pay in the PNM). “Now how could you operate with even-handedness in the face of this situation,” he said. Mark said he did not know if Baboolal and Sinanan were intimidated by the PNM Government and by the knowledge that a previous Manning Government had locked up a Speaker who wouldn’t do his bidding, (Occah Seapaul). Mark who several weeks ago accused Danny Montano of behaving like a white slave master, stated that the UNC stood for national unity, justice, inclusion and equality.

AN ECONOMIC Crimes Unit (ECU) is to be established in the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) to include investigation into money laundering and the financing of terrorism.

This was revealed yesterday by DPP Geoffrey Henderson at an Anti-Money Laundering Seminar at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. Henderson said the DPP’s department had been more focussed on other matters such as murder, rape and kidnapping. “There must be a heightened profile now in the department,” Henderson declared. Henderson said he submitted a recommendation only last week for the establishment of the ECU. This unit’s responsibility will not only include the prosecution of major fraud and corruption cases, but will concentrate on the prosecution of money laundering and the financing of terrorism.

The DPP said such units exist in other countries who pursue money laundering offences. The unit will include persons from the Financial Investigations Unit, prosecutors and attorneys who will work closely with investigators to ensure prosecutions are effected. Henderson is hopeful that the ECU will get off the ground during the next financial year. He also stated that the Proceeds of Crime Act 2000 has not been effectively used as a tool to eradicate money laundering.  “To date, we have had just one money laundering prosecution. We have had matters of money being confiscated, but in terms of the actual prosecution, we have had just one. And, even that matter was still borne at the stage of committal proceedings. We have not used the legislation effectively as a tool to eradicate such offences.

FORMER Housing Minister John Humphrey admitted yesterday that the Piarco Airport although very well designed has some faults and should not have cost as much as it did. It has been suggested that the cost of the airport is $1.6 billion.

Humphrey also said he felt he had fulfilled his duties as Chairman of the Inter-Ministerial Committee until recently when a number of questions arose as to whether he was truly effective in his role. He said his doubts arose because of evidence he heard at the Commission of Inquiry into the Piarco Airport Development Project. Humphrey was being re-examined yesterday by his attorney Sean Cazabon. When he was asked what he thought were the reasons for the cost overuns on the project, Humphrey said the major reason was that NIPDEC did not understand the fasttrack method which was being used. He said NIPDEC was allowed to use its own tendering process which bore no relation to the fast-track method and did not put the personnel in place to deal with the project. He insisted that the Airports Authority (AA) was the competent authority to handle the project as was done initially and whoever had informed then Prime Minister Basdeo Panday to remove the project from the AA to NIPDEC “was ill-advised to do so”.

Humphrey also said it was a mistake to fire the professional team which was on the project initially. He also suggested to the Commission that it recommend measures on how to proceed with similar projects in the future. He agreed with Chairman Clinton Bernard that in the future all major government projects should have local experts at the helm leading foreigners, rather than vice versa, as happened on the Piarco project. He denied he was trying to defend Birk Hillman Consultants and pointed out that besides Northern Construction Limited, other contractors got substantial increases in their contracts compared to their original contract price.

ATTORNEY GENERAL Glenda Morean revealed yesterday that a sizeable portion of money, which was illegally removed from the public purse during the term of the UNC Government, would be returned to the treasury.

Morean-Phillip said that although the final accounting has not been received, she believes that the money illegally removed between 1995 to 2001 will be returned. She, however, did not say how the money would be returned. The Attorney General also pointed out that $8 million has so far been confiscated by the State from the proceeds of drug trafficking. “That may not seem a lot, but it was done under the law which allows us to do that.” (That money was seized from four persons convicted at a drug trial). Morean-Phillip formally opened an Anti-Money Laundering seminar at the Crowne Plaza Hotel yesterday. Participants came from the State sector including the Inland Revenue Department, police  and Customs and Excise.

During her address, Morean said the proliferation of weapons has led the kind of violence now being experienced in Trinidad and Tobago, which her Government is committed to eradicating. “By tackling the issue of money laundering, we attack the profitability of the criminal network and get at the heart of the vast criminal conspiracy that threatens our society.” Morean said the United Nations estimates the global money laundering problem to be in the region of US one trillion dollars. The Caribbean’s contribution is projected at US $50 billion, which according to the AG, surpasses this country’s annual budget of TT $20 billion.

Morean said the Proceeds of Crime Act 2000 targets persons directly involved in money laundering, those assisting them and the people who receive the proceeds of the crime. The law, she added, also places responsibilities on financial institutions to assist in the fight against money laundering. “As Attorney General, it is my duty to ensure that the requisite laws are in place to aid our law enforcement agencies in their attempt to rid the society of the scourge of crime. “As a Government, we are committed to ensuring that the social responses to the problem of crime are timely and appropriate, and to ensuring that the law enforcement agencies are given the necessary tools for the proper discharge of their functions.”