Charges amended against former GRDB officials

Jan 11, 2018 News

The 34 fraud related charges against two former, Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) officials were yesterday amended by Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan after Special Prosecutor, Patrice Henry, told the court that he was given instructions by the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) to amend the charges.

The two officials charged are former General Manager of the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) Jagnarine Singh, and former Deputy General of GRDB and People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) Member, Madanlall Ramraj.

It is alleged that between 2011 and 2012, at Lot 16-17 Cowan Street, Kingstown, they omitted to enter, or to make true entries of over $4.2M into the company’s ledger, knowing that it was contrary to standard operation procedures.
Other charges state that during the same time frame, the two officials are alleged to have fraudulently taken $5.1M or applied the money for their own use and benefit or any use and purpose, other than that of the GRDB.

Yesterday, when the matter was called in the Chief Magistrate’s courtroom, the prosecutor made the application to amend the 34 charges.

Eighteen charges will now read “It is alleged that the two between 2011 and 2012, at Lot 16-17 Cowan Street, Kingstown, they fraudulently took $5.1M for or any use or purpose, other than that of the GRDB.” While sixteen of the charges will now read “It is alleged that between 2011 and 2012, at Lot 16-17 Cowan Street, Kingstown, they omitted to make true entries of over $4.2M into the company’s ledger, knowing that it was contrary to standard operation procedures.”
Yesterday defence lawyer, Glenn Hanoman, told the court that it is very frustrating for his clients citing that it is the second time the prosecution has made changes to the charges.

The lawyer went on to tell the court that SOCU does not know what it is doing with the matter and is constantly making changes because the charges are bad.

Prosecutor Henry stated that the prosecution will be filing over 2000 pages of photocopy statements. The investigation is completed, he said.

The matter was adjourned until February 1 for the defendants to collect their statements.

Already, in one case, six former high-ranking officials of GRDB, including Jagnarine and Ramraj, have been charged and placed on $500,000 bail each for allegedly failing to make a proper entry into a register of a company with the intent to defraud $362M from the entity’s Republic Bank account.
The six officials also included General Secretary of the Producers Association (RPA) and PPP/C Member of Parliament, Dharamkumar Seeraj; former Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Amerindian Affairs and PPP/C Member of Parliament, Nigel Dharamlall; former General Manager of the Guyana Oil Company Badrie Persaud; and the Deputy Permanent Secretary, Finance Ministry of Agriculture, Prema Roopnarine.
The accused all pleaded not guilty to the charges which alleged that between January 1 and December 31, 2012, with intent to defraud, they omitted or concurred to be omitted $77.3M from the general ledger of the GRDB’s Republic Bank account.
Similarly, between 2013, 2014 and 2015 with intent to defraud the entity, they are alleged to have omitted or concurred to be omitted from the said Republic Bank account, $9.7M, $130M and $145M for three respective years.

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