Inquiry into ex-AG Ramlogan's witness-tampering charges set for July

A trial date has been set for a week in July for the inquiry into allegations of witness tampering against former attorney general Anand Ramlogan, SC, on.

Chief Magistrate Maria Busby Earle-Caddle set aside a week from July 11 at a virtual hearing on Monday, at which she had some stern words for the prosecution after another was sought.

The Chief Magistrate pointed out the matter concerned a 2014 allegation for which Ramlogan was charged in 2017.

After refusing to set the matter for another status hearing, she set the dates for the trial in July.

At the last hearing in November, she had been told talks were going on between the Director of Public Prosecutions and attorneys for Ramlogan.

Details of the discussions were not revealed by deputy DPP George Busby, who also appeared for the State at Monday’s hearing.

At that hearing, Earle-Caddle also enquired about the age of the case involving the witness-tampering charge.

“Mr Busby, this matter was filed in September 2017. We are now in 2021. How many years has the DPP and senior counsel been having conversations about this matter?... It is a lot of catching up to do,” she asked.

At that time she gave both sides until Monday “to progress the matter one way or the other.” She said the frequent adjournments caused problems for her case management, telling attorneys to consider setting trial dates or having the matter sent directly to the High Court.

It was envisaged that the matter would have been caught by the abolition of preliminary inquiries for indictable criminal offences in January this year. However, the amendment to the law is yet to be proclaimed.

In the corruption kickback matter involving Ramlogan and former UNC senator Gerald Ramdeen, the Chief Magistrate granted an adjournment to May 31.

In December, prosecutors said the DPP intended to bypass the preliminary inquiry in the lower courts and have Ramdeen and Ramlogan’s matter go directly to the High Court to the indictment.

Ramlogan alone is charged in the witness-tampering case.

In October, Busby told the chief magistrate the DPP wanted the two matters kept together.

In that matter, for which he was charged in 2017, Ramlogan is accused of misbehaviour in public office and obstruction of justice. The charge surrounds an allegation by Police Complaints Authority director David West that Ramlogan approached him to withdraw his witness statement in a defamation case against then opposition leader Dr Keith Rowley in 2014.

Ramlogan’s attorneys have previously said they intended to question West, former police commissioner Gary Griffith, and Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi.

Griffith, a former minister of national security, and Ramlogan, who was AG, were fired from the Cabinet in 2015 after police started an investigation.

In the corruption kickback case, both Ramdeen and Ramlogan were charged in 2019 with conspiring with Jamaican-born Queen’s Counsel Vincent Nelson for Ramlogan to misbehave in public office as AG, by accepting money from Nelson as a reward for giving him state briefs.

It is further alleged that they conspired for Ramdeen to receive, conceal, and transfer criminal property which represented corrupt rewards given to him by Nelson for the state briefs.

The third allegation against the two is that they conspired for Nelson to give ten per cent of the legal fees to Ramlogan as a “gift” or “reward” for being granted state briefs.

They were charged in May 2019.

In March 2020, Nelson, who pleaded guilty in June 2019 to his part in the alleged kickback scheme, was ordered to pay $2.25 million restitution as part of a plea-bargain arrangement with the State. As part of the deal, he agreed to turn state witness and testify against Ramlogan and Ramdeen.

Ramlogan is represented by Senior Counsel Pamela Elder, SC, and attorney Russell Warner.

Appearing for Ramdeen are attorneys Mario Merritt, Karunaa Bisramsingh and Alexia Romero.