GRA employees, police constable charged with forging driver’s licence

Jun 14, 2022 News

Kaieteur News – Three Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) employees along with a Police Special Constable were on Monday charged for allegedly forging a driver’s licence.

Charged, Akeem Martin and Ruth Williams.

The defendants: Reguel Jack of Lot 1695 Unity Place, South Ruimveldt, Georgetown; Akeem Martin, of Lot 19 Old Road Den Amstel, and Ruth Williams of Lot 27 A, Sera Lodge Stewartville, West Coast Demerara, all GRA employees and Police Special Constable, Winston Small, of Lot 43 Avocado Place, East Ruimveldt, Georgetown, were all charged by the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) an arm of the Guyana Police Force (GPF).
The defendant appeared in the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts before Senior Magistrate Leron Daly. Martin and Williams were charged jointly, while Jack and Small were charged separately. They denied the charges that were read to them, and bail was granted in the sum of $100,000 each. The matter was then adjourned to August 29, 2022.
According to information, SOCU and GRA conducted an investigation which revealed that during October 2021, Small arranged with one, Shaquan Caesar, a minibus conductor, who was working with Antoney Salaman Jacobs, a bus driver, that he can get a driver’s licence for him at a cost of $83,000.

Charged, Reguel Jack and Winston Small.

It was stated that Small indicated to Caesar that he can use Antoney driver’s licence and he will get someone to change the photograph. As such, the conductor reportedly obtained a photograph of the bus driver’s licence and on November 1, 2021, the duo went to a clerk at the Maraj building, located in Georgetown and told her that Caesar [the bus conductor] is Antoney Salaman Jacobs [the bus driver].
The men reportedly told the clerk that Caesar lost his driver’s licence and identification card and requested an affidavit to take to GRA to process his driver’s licence. Based on the request, the clerk drafted an affidavit in favour of Antoney Salaman Jacobs and took it to a Justice of Peace (JP) who did not question but signed it.
After obtaining the affidavit, on November 1, 2021, Small took Caesar to GRA with the affidavit where Jack, a lodgment clerk, who took Caesar’s photograph via the Licence Revenue Processing System (LRPS) and processed a driver’s licence for him in the name of Antoney Salaman Jacobs with Jacobs’s driver’s licence details.
The driver’s licence was issued to Caesar but he lost it two weeks after. As such, on December 16, 2021 Small and Caesar again obtained another affidavit and went to GRA, where Martin, also a lodgment clerk at GRA, took Caesar’s photograph via the LRPS and placed it onto Antoney Salaman Jacobs’s licence.
It is alleged that Martin did the transaction without any form of identification. Moreover, the licence was keyed by Williams, a query clerk who certified that the transaction was authentic despite irregularities with the identification details and affidavit. Caesar was issued a second licence in the name of someone else.
However, on January 25, 2022, Caesar was arrested for breach of a traffic offence. The traffic rank that arrested Caesar questioned him about the driver’s licence since he was acquainted with the identity of Jacobs. Caesar later admitted that he paid money to get a bogus licence.
He was subsequently charged with forgery and uttering forged documents. When Caesar appeared in court, he pleaded guilty to both offences and was fined. Further investigation later led to Small, Martin, Williams and Jack being arrested and charged.