| Three more held for trial on SIPT charges | | Print | |
| Written by Richard Green/richard@fptci.com | |||
| Thursday, 24 May 2012 17:33 | |||
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Former minister McAllister Hanchell and lawyers Chal Misick and Melbourne Wilson have been ordered to stand trial on various charges of corruption. Supreme Court Justice Margaret Ramsay-Hale ruled May 17 after sufficiency hearings that the Special Investigation and Prosecution Team has enough evidence to proceed against the three. Chal Misick — former premier Michael Misick’s brother — and Wilson are accused of money laundering, while Hanchell is accused of conspiracy to commit bribery. In April, four others conceded that SIPT had enough evidence to take them to trial, including former government ministers Floyd Hall and Jeffery Hall for conspiracy to defraud the government, and developers Richard Padgett and Jak Civre for bribery. Also in April the justice found that SIPT has enough evidence to proceed with trials of Floyd Hall’s wife, Lisa, for conspiracy to defraud the government; former ministers Lillian Boyce and Samuel Been on charges of conspiracy to defraud the government; lawyer and Progressive National Party Leader Clayton Greene on charges of money laundering; and Quentin Hall and Earlson Robinson on charges of accepting proceeds of a crime. Sufficiency hearings are open to the public and the news media, but Turks and Caicos Islands law forbids publication of all but the outcome of the hearings. None of the evidence discussed can be published, but prosecutors have said in previous hearings that the charges involve fraudulent Crown land transactions and bribery of government officials by developers. Prosecutors are seeking to try the defendants before a Supreme Court justice without a jury, a decision that has not yet been made. The absolute right to a trial by jury in the Supreme Court has been removed from the Constitution, and a new law passed by the interim government allows defendants, prosecutors or judges to request trials without juries, which is similar to the law in the U.K. Under the new law, a judge would make the decision, which can be appealed to a three-judge Court of Appeal. The judge who makes the ruling then would not be the judge who tries the case. Michael Misick has not been charged with any crimes, but he has refused to report to SIPT for questioning. An Interpol notice has been issued for his arrest, but Misick says he is seeking asylum in an undisclosed country to escape political persecution.
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