A sum of more than $10 million which has been seized by the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) from a convicted drug trafficker has been forfeited to the State.
According to a statement from the Special Organized Crime Unit (SOCU), the money, equivalent to US$48,560, was seized and detained from Kevin Gordon because it was the proceeds from a crime.
Justice Navindra Singh
High Court Judge Navindra Singh ordered the State to transfer the currency to the Consolidated Fund, as provided for according to the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Act Cap 10:11. The court further ordered that Gordon pay to SOCU costs of $1.5 million.
On Sunday, May 28, 2017, at 08:52h, at Parika, East Bank Essequibo, the currency was confiscated from Gordon, of 18 Jib Housing Scheme, Essequibo, by ranks of CANU during a search of his haversack. Also in the haversack were 209 pounds, or 94.954 kilograms, of cocaine.
Gordon and another man were subsequently charged and convicted for drug trafficking. They were each sentenced to two years’ imprisonment and fined $99 million following a guilty ruling after a trial in the Magistrates’ Court.
According to SOCU, Gordon had denied ownership of the currency and claimed that it belonged to one Deon Williams. Williams had indicated that the currency was his property and it was derived from the sale of fuel. However, the State led evidence to prove that Williams was not licensed to deal in petroleum and petroleum products.
The court was satisfied that the penalty for breach of the Guyana Energy Agency Regulation includes imprisonment for three years. SOCU said, “The State proved its case on a balance of probability, and the court, satisfied that the currency is the proceeds of crime, gave judgment in favour of SOCU by ordering the confiscation of the cash as part of the proceeds of crime.”
Back in 2019, SOCU failed in its bid to secure the forfeiture of more than $7 million in local currency and millions more in foreign currencies that the Police had stated were found during a search of the home of a Berbice resident as part of a money-laundering probe.
The application alleged that moneychanger Mohamed Jamalodeen Nazmodin had been engaged in the business of buying and selling foreign currency in breach of the Dealers in Foreign Currency (Licensing) Act.
However, in his ruling on the application, Justice Navindra Singh has stated, among other things, the state’s failure at establishing the offence of money-laundering against Nazmodin, and the purported warrant being void. He also said he viewed the warrant as being “very suspicious,” given the manner in which it was obtained.
In addition, Justice Singh ordered not only that all the currencies seized from Nazmodin be forthwith returned to him, but that interest at a rate of 6% per annum be paid in Guyana currency based on the value of all the currencies in Guyana dollars and calculated at the cambio exchange rates listed by Republic Bank Guyana Limited.
The Police had been hoping to be granted the forfeiture order for the following sums seized from Nazmodin: Gy$7,086,000; US$68,703; TT$1,741; SR$42,140; EC$26,205; €14,945; CDN$8,710; and £7,930.
