440 charges read to inspector’s wife

Legal history was created in the magistrates court yesterday when a total of 440 charges were read to one person, - 34-year-old Princes Town housewife Tinisha Gosine-Ramdass.

The charges are the largest number laid by the Fraud Squad department of the Police Service in which Gosine-Ramdass is accused of stealing and laundering approximately $2.8 million from a businessplace where she worked. She appeared before Magistrate Indira Misir-Gosine in the Princes Town court, having been arrested with her husband, Inspector Darryl Ramdass last week Thursday.

On Tuesday night, Gosine-Ramdass of King Street, Princes Town, was taken from the Maraval Police Station to the Princes Town Police Station where she spent the night in a cell before yesterday’s court appearance.

At 1 pm she was escorted in handcuffs before Misir-Gosine who began reading the charge at 1.15 pm.

The magistrate read 157 charges in which the woman is alleged, on various dates in 2011 to 2014, to have stolen money from A Tech Products and Services Limited, of Petit Cafe, Moruga where she was employed.

The magistrate asked Gosine-Ramdass to sit as she continued reading charge after charge, all of which were laid indictably.

They stemmed from several months of investigations led by Fraud Squad Head Snr Supt Totaram Dookhie and included ASP Kent Ghisiyawan and Sgt Cornelius Samuel. Attorney Hubert Charles and Shirvani Ramkissoon represented the woman.

Her husband, who appeared in the Port of Spain Magistrates Court on Tuesday charged with illegal possession of eight macaws, was present yesterday for his wife’s court appearance.

Misir-Gosine took a break at about 3.30 pm, then resumed the reading of the charges, 137 of which were laid under the Proceeds of Crime Act for alleged money laundering.

Another 150 were for alleged falsification of documents in which, on various dates between 2013 and 2014, Gosine-Ramdass, at Petit Cafe, Moruga, allegedly falsified documents in which various sums of money were deposited into an account at a commercial bank.

Court clerks had to remain beyond their 4 pm shift to book all 440 charges and clerks walked in and out the court while the magistrate read the charges, to take away and return with charge sheets. At 7.30 pm, Misir-Gosine had read 434 charges. Charles and Ramkissoon were expected to plead for bail to be granted to the woman.