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Sacked OP employee’s home searched for “flash drive with state secrets”
Marcelle Joseph
Police swooped down on the West Coast Demerara home of the mother of sacked Office of the President employee Marcelle Joseph, yesterday, claiming that they were in search of a flash drive that contained state secrets.
But the move has not gone down well with Joseph’s relatives who are convinced that the administration is trying to intimidate them following certain exposures made by the sacked employee.
Joseph was fired from her job two weeks ago after she was suspected of leaking information to this newspaper, on the controversial purchase of 20 laptop computers by the Office of the President.
The woman has categorically denied the allegation against her and has since fled to the United States of America, claiming that she fears for her life, following threats allegedly made by a senior government official.
The search of her mother’s house, where Joseph resided before she fled Guyana, came at a time when several controversial issues within the Office of the President have surfaced.
In an interview with this newspaper yesterday, Joseph’s mother said that around 17:00 hours, a green minibus pulled up in front of her home with four men wearing civilian clothes inside.
She said that from the look of the individuals, they appeared to be policemen, and immediately one of them, who was wearing white shirt-jac identified himself as an Inspector from the Criminal Investigations Department Headquarters, Eve Leary.
“I was sitting on my verandah and he asked me the lot and I told him. He said that they were sent by the Office of the President and I asked them why. He said that they were looking for a flash drive,” the sacked employee’s mother told this newspaper.
She informed that the Inspector told her that they were made to understand that Joseph had left the country on Sunday.
The ranks even asked her for an address in the United States of America where Joseph is staying but she just responded that her daughter was not around.
“They came into the house and looked around and then asked for Marcelle’s room,” the distraught woman said.
After informing the ranks that Joseph slept with her in the same room, the Inspector proceeded into it and carried out a search, even peering into a bed drawer before returning to his juniors who were in the living room.
“They had a brown envelope but I don’t know what was inside. They asked me how much people lived in the house and where my other daughters were working,” Joseph’s mother disclosed.
She said that she told the inspector that she expected them to come, “because I know what they give,” she added.
According to Joseph’s mother when the ranks left she began to cry.
“Why are they harassing me now? I don’t even have a computer in my house and I don’t know what a flash drive looks like. I don’t know what to do,” she lamented.
She indicated that she has informed her daughter in the United States about the incident and Joseph was very upset.
Meanwhile, social activist Mark Benschop, who is looking into the interests of the family, has indicated that he will be contracting the services of an attorney to prevent the police from repeating similar acts unless they are in possession of a proper warrant signed by a judge.
“This is a clear case of the Office of the President giving instructions to the police. Marcelle was here in Guyana and no one sought her out then, but now they are harassing her family. This clearly has to do with recent revelations in the press about the Office of the President and this type of action has to stop,” Benschop said.
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