~ Submitting dossier to Parliament and Council of Ministers were part of the reasons to dismiss.
PHILIPSBURG:--- The holding board of the Princess Juliana International Airport dismissed its Chief Operations Officer (COO) Michel Hyman on Monday at an extraordinary meeting that was called by the Holding Board.
Based on the agenda points for the meeting Hyman was dismissed on two grounds.
The violations of duties and obligations based on the meeting of December 23rd, 2021, and the leaking of confidential information which is the dossier that was submitted to the Parliament and Council of Ministers of St. Maarten.
Michel Hyman worked for 28 years at the Princess Juliana International Airport, he was the Manager and Director of Operations prior to being appointed Chief Operations Officer on 1st August 2017.
Hyman was accused of not following procedures post-Irma while he was the sole director of PJIAE. Prosecutors claim that Hyman paid invoices for the clean-up and fencing while works were not done. The case which is still being investigated is code-named Mitte.
Since his arrest and release the Supervisory Board of PJIAE demanded to know why Hyman did not report to work for 9 days starting from October 22nd, 2021, a meeting was called on October 26th, 2021 while Hyman was incarnated, in that meeting a decision was taken to suspend the then arrested COO for a period of 2 months. On December 23rd, 2021, a follow-up meeting was held where the SBOD decided to dismiss Hyman but that was delayed until a forensic audit was conducted on the procedures followed to dismiss Hyman from his position.
Since the release of Michel Hyman no official charges were instituted against Hyman, in a press release issued on October 22nd, 2021 states that the RST Recherche Samenwerkingsteam (RST) arrested two people and conducted searches at two houses and at the addresses of two businesses on Sint Maarten under the supervision of the investigating magistrate.
The arrests of Michel Hyman and Rene Guishard and the searches are related to an extensive investigation codenamed “Mitte” and are focused on fraud related to clean up and repair works carried out at Princess Juliana International Airport after Hurricane Irma.
The “Mitte” investigation is executed RST under the leadership of the Anti-Corruption Taskforce TBO of the Attorney-General’s Office of Curacao, Sint Maarten, Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, and Saba.
TBO focuses on a specialized approach to combat corruption and subversion of financial and economic crime. Additionally, the team investigates fraud, forgery, and money laundering
