Deputy PM wants Thorne investigated

Deputy Prime Minister Santia Bradshaw on Wednesday called on Attorney Genearal Dale Marshall to reopen an investigation into a 2009 report by the Urban Development Commission (UDC) that raised questions about the transfer of several tenantry lands in which Opposition Leader Ralph Thorne is named.

And she has challenged the senior counsel to give an account to the country.

“I would like on the floor of this House, to request of the honourable Attorney General to ensure that the file in this matter that was sent to the Commissioner of Police is reopened and that a senior officer is put in place to deal with this matter to determine whether there is any truth to what is here,” Bradshaw told the House.

Reading from a letter dated November 29, 2009 addressed to the Commissioner of Police about the report written by Guyson Mayers and presented to the Board of the UDC in response to their request to investigate reports made by clients of the commission, Bradshaw said,” the commission is of the view that the report points to activities that may be considered as maladministration at best.”

“This report concerns a number of irregularities that developed in the handling of the transfer of title proceedings by an officer – and I’m not calling any names, Madam Deputy Speaker, but by an officer who is the principal legal counsel at the Urban Development Commission,” said Bradshaw who made reference to three cheques – for $12 250, $6 705.97 and $12 500 – all dated August 9 – drawn on the UDC’s Capital works account and paid to Mr Ralph A Thorne, attorney-at-law, in respect of three different lots on behalf of clients.

Providing more details from the report, Bradshaw read: “It is of interest and probably a matter that needs further investigation, that these cases were all referred to the same attorney-at-law who is known to be close to the principal legal counsel on the same date.

Some considerable time has passed since these referrals without the work had been completed.

“However, this delay, though inordinate, may not necessarily speak to unlawfulness. However, the determinative factor is whether the attorney’s inaction amounts to him assuming the role of the owner by deciding what should be done with the money in his possession.”

The report went on to say: “It may reasonably be assumed that if one is in possession of funds for in excess of four years and has done no visible work in relation to the matter referred, then one has perhaps stepped into the shoes of the owner for the purposes of the control of those funds.”

The issue, she said, was whether each of the beneficiaries freely chose Thorne as their legal representative as she revealed other cases where she claimed the clients did not know that Thorne was their representative in the matter.

In cases involving two lots at Lower Burney, St Michael, Bradshaw said, the principal legal officer advanced a government subsidy of cheques to Thorne on March 19, 2007, and accompanying letters were signed by the legal officers who stated that the cheques were expected to be held in escrow by Thorne pending delivery of an executed copy of the conveyance in these matters.

Bradshaw said Mayers pointed out in the report to the UDC that, “It was not common practice for money to be sent to another in order that it can be held in escrow pending the delivery of completed work that this may have been peculiarly motivated, maybe evidenced by the fact that two years later, the documents awaited have not yet been delivered and the monies forwarded have not yet been paid to the new beneficiary”.

The report, according to Bradshaw, said there was doubt as to whether the proper procedure had been followed. Mayers explained that the practice was for the commission’s principal legal assistant to prepare the conveyance in such matters which would then be forwarded to the attorney who is acting for the tenants.

Bradshaw also revealed a third matter which dated back to June 2008. She said a woman visited the commission’s office to enquire about the process that would enable her to purchase the lot of land she occupied in Taylor’s Land, Bank Hall, St Michael.

The report said: “The lady had never had any prior contact with the commission about the purchase of her lot, but the file revealed that a government subsidy to the tune of $6 458.40 had been paid to Mr Ralph Thorne on her behalf concerning lot nine of the said tenantry on the 22nd of January 2004, four years prior to her even expressing an interest in the purchase of the loan.

“In this case, the tenant had never been in contact with her presumed attorney-at-law and had never had a conversation with the principal legal assistant who prepared the correspondence and facilitated the payments of the commission’s funds on her behalf in circumstances that could only have properly taken place with her consent.”

Bradshaw further cited that on September 9, 2005, the UDC paid a subsidy in the amount of $17 500 to Thorne on behalf of another client for Halls Land Tenantry, St Michael.

The report said, “This payment was directed to Mr Thorne in error as it was intended for another attorney by a letter dated the sixth of April 2006. Just a year later, Mr Thorne was informed of this error and to pass the $17 500 that was sent to him in error by the commission to its rightful target the 2009.

“It is worth noting that the officer had directed this cheque to Mr Thorne and it was not until the tenant visited the commission’s office and asserted that Mr Thorne was not her attorney, but in fact that there was another attorney that was on record for her, that a reversal of this transfer was attempted by the chief project officer,” Mayers’ report stated.

Bradshaw called for a response from Thorne to statements in the Mayers report.

“I want the honourable leader of the opposition, the leader of the Democratic Labour Party to answer some questions,” she said.