FIA  Burglary:  Kenny-­‐Frederick  files?                                        by  Rick  Wayne    Minister  of  Justice  Philip  La  Corbiniere:  What  does  he  know  about  the  FIA  burglary  and  has  he  communicated  details  to  his  Prime  Minister?    Last  September,  this  newspaper  featured  a  lead  item  entitled:  “Remember  What  You  Know  that  I  Know  that  You  Know  that  I  Know?”  If  to  the  uninformed  eye  the  headline  read  like  gibberish,  it  nevertheless  reminded  most  Saint  Lucians  of  the  anything  but  funny  famous  2006  pre-­‐election  confrontation  outside  the  NIC  conference  room,  featuring  the  soon  to  be  unseated  Prime  Minister  Kenny  Anthony  and  newcomer  to  the  arena  but  already  controversial  Richard  Frederick,  an  independent  candidate  seeking  to  replace  the  incumbent  Castries  Central  MP.    No  need  to  revisit  the  cited  publication.  Suffice  it  to  say  it  referenced  an  August  2013  SLP  rally  when  the  SLP  leader  and  prime  minister  not  only  

uncharacteristically  sang  lustily  for  his  USDA-­‐approved  cheeseburger,  but  also  acknowledged  that  without  US  greenbacks,  local  law  enforcement  efforts  at  combating  human  and  drug  trafficking  would  be  severely  handicapped.    While  earlier  the  Minister  for  Legal  Affairs  had  sought  to  invalidate  my  revelation  that  funding  supplied  under  the  Leahy  Law  arrangements  had  been  suspended—as  punishment  for  the  government’s  self-­‐serving  reluctance  to  investigate  alleged  human  rights  violations  by  local  cops—the  prime  minister  was  subsequently  left  little  choice  but  to  confirm  my  story,  as  diplomatically  as  possible,  during  a  televised  public  address.    For  certain  particularly  well-­‐informed  readers,  however,  perhaps  the  scariest  part  of  my  September  account  was  the  warning  of  a  “combustible  matter  about  to  bust  wide  open,  involving  the  Financial  Intelligence  Authority,  whose  director  is  local  lawyer  Paul  Thompson.  The  rest  of  the  unit  comprises  police  and  customs  officers.”    The  FIA  was  set  up  to  deal  particularly  with  money  laundering  and  other  crimes  involving  finance.    The  final  paragraph:  “For  the  time  being  I  need  only  ask  again:  What  does  the  prime  minister  know  about  this  ticking  FIA  bomb  that  Richard  Frederick  may  or  may  not  know,  and  about  which  Philip  J.  Pierre  and  fellow  Cabinet  colleagues  may  have  not  a  clue?  This  time  around,  who  will  be  the  sacrificial  lamb?”    Although  I  had  strategically  neglected  to  mention  it  at  the  time,  my  sources  had  suggested  that  never  mind  the  well-­‐publicized  laundering  of  their  dirty  linen  on  Bridge  Street  and  in  William  Peter  Boulevard,  away  from  prying  ears  the  prime  minister  and  Richard  Frederick  enjoyed  an  association  a  long  way  from  acrimonious.  I  might’ve  easily  accepted  the  incredible  suggestion  had  it  involved  any  other  two  politicians.  The  prime  minister  and  the  Castries  Central  MP  was  altogether  another  cup  of  canelle  tea.    There  was  no  official  reaction;  at  any  rate,  publicly.  But  well-­‐positioned  sources  had  assured  me  my  article  ruffled  some  feathers  high  up  the  ovine  food  chain.  

Indeed,  my  article  seemed  to  have  confirmed  their  long-­‐held  suspicions  I  not  only  had  CIA  and  US  State  Department  sources,  but  also  close  links  with  local  government  personnel  connected  with  American  agencies.    Whether  or  not  true,  that  was  hardly  the  point.  I  had  fully  expected  some  official  reaction.  In  particular,  to  my  not-­‐so-­‐subtle  suggestion  that  the  US  visas  held  by  certain  cops  were  under  threat—the  justice  minister’s  too,  if  the  government  continued  to  drag  its  feet  on  promises  to  the  State  Department  relating  to  the  suspected  human  rights  violations  by  local  cops.    Then  came  the  public  announcement  that  in  keeping  with  US  demands,  IMPACS,  a  previously  unheard  of  OECS  group  comprising  largely  distrusted  Jamaican  cops,  had  started  looking  into  allegations  that  members  of  the  RSLPF  had  in  2011  extra-­‐judicially  disposed  of  several  supposedly  troublesome  citizens  during  Operation  Restore  Confidence.    Under  normal  circumstances,  once  such  an  investigation  was  underway,  funding  to  the  police  would’ve  been  restored.  In  this  instance,  the  Leahy  funds  continue  to  be  withheld,  a  fact  recently  acknowledged  officially  here.    Lately,  however,  our  self-­‐convinced  oracular  legal  affairs  minister  has  been  bragging  all  over  the  pussycat  local  media.  Perhaps  in  response  to  my  treatment  of  his  risible  attempt  at  intimidating  our  reporters,  the  SLP-­‐plagued  Timothy  Poleon  in  particular,  the  minister  has  been  suggesting  I  knew  not  whence  I  cometh—evinced  by  his  retention  of  his  US  visa.    Of  course,  the  reason  for  that  is  the  IMPACS  investigation.  How  long  the  unelected  minister  is  allowed  to  keep  his  visa  will,  I  suspect,  depend  on  the  impact  of  IMPACS,  expected  to  report  its  findings  next  month.    Meanwhile,  another  bombshell  involving  the  Financial  Intelligence  Authority:  it  turns  out  a  special  file,  according  to  my  sources,  “this  thick,”  and  cash  exhibits  totaling  some  $US4000  that  were  kept  in  an  ostensibly  “secure  cabinet”  at  the  FIA,  have  vanished.    The  legal  affairs  minister,  who  was  recently  issuing  threats  against  

sections  of  the  media  via  RSL,  has  known  for  some  time  about  the  missing  file  and  money,  but  has  chosen  to  keep  the  matter  from  the  general  public.  I  cannot  say,  for  certain,  whether  he  has  informed  his  prime  minister.    My  information  is  that  he  also  knows  who  removed  the  file  without  expressed  justification—and  its  present  location.  The  minister  is  also  aware  that  certain  items  have  inexplicably  disappeared  from  the  file.  As  for  the  missing  thousands,  there  has  been  no  accounting  for  the  withdrawal.    The  reason  the  file  was  removed  from  the  FIA  secure  cabinet  is,  to  say  the  least,  perplexing.  My  sources  tell  me  the  excuse  centers  on  a  burglary  that  went  unreported  until  long  after  the  fact.  The  legal  affairs  minister  alone  knows  what  he  did  with  the  received  information.  To  the  best  of  my  knowledge  the  police  are  not  investigating  the  matter,  at  any  rate,  not  with  any  noticeable  urgency!    The  stolen  money  was  an  exhibit  in  the  Donovan  Lorde  case,  at  least  five  years  pending.  As  for  the  items  extracted  from  the  “this  thick”  file,  it  concerned  the  earlier  mentioned  behind  the  scenes  relationship  between  the  prime  minister  and  the  much-­‐maligned  Castries  Central  MP—especially  by  the  Minister  for  Legal  Affairs!    Several  years  ago  a  vault  containing  classified  documents  and  an  undisclosed  amount  of  money  was  surreptitiously  removed  from  the  office  of  the  police  commissioner.    The  STAR  broke  that  story,  which  was  subsequently  officially  confirmed.  Hopefully,  the  FIA  director  and  the  Minister  for  Legal  Affairs  will  be,  however  late  in  the  day,  as  forthcoming.     The plot thickens!