Philipsburg:--- The Landsrecherche was one day away from their deadline for handing over the files on the election fraud case to the Prosecutor's Office. Chief Prosecutor Hans Mos confirmed to SMN News on Thursday that he had given the Landsrecherche until March 1st, 2013 to complete and turn over the files to his office so that they can begin studying those files and take a decision on how to move forward. Mos said that the Landsrecherche turned over the files on Thursday February 28th, 2013 to the Prosecutor's office. When asked by SMN News how soon he will have information to release on the decision his office will take on the case, Mos said that his colleague has to study the file and in his opinion it will take them about one month to fully study the file because there is a lot of reading to do.
The Internal Affairs of the Police Department (KPSM) conducted an investigation into the election fraud case that involves four police officers and the leader of the United Peoples Party in 2010 when the news broke that three officers took a police vehicle and went to the UP head office and collected four envelopes each containing $300. The three officers got greedy and they opened the fourth envelope and shared the money among the three that went and collected the envelopes. When the fourth officer learnt that his colleagues had cheated him of the monies that were meant for him, a brawl broke out inside the police station which prompted the investigation.
The election fraud case has been sitting in the office of the Landsrecherche since 2011 and only recently the file was taken off the shelves and work was done on it. At first reporters were told the department Landsrecherche was understaffed and that case was not on their priority list. But since the media has refused to let the Landsrecherche and the Prosecutor's office off the hook on some of the cases that they have been holding on to for years and nothing is done to them, those in the main seats in the those two departments have decided to finally work on this case.
Another case that is still sitting on the desk of the Landsrecherche is the case involving former Health and Labour Affairs Maria Buncamper Molanus. Just some weeks ago the Minister who was ousted from office announced that she will be contesting the 2014 elections. It is expected that the Prosecutor's Office will also take a decision on the Buncamper Molanus case. In addition, the case involving the Director of the Princess Juliana International Airport Regina Labega, Edward Dest, Member of Parliament Frans Richardson. The people of St. Maarten are still waiting to see when that case that was filed by the former Director of Finance Bas Roorda will take off. Late December 2012 the Prosecutor's Office arrested former Minister of Finance Hiro Shigemoto in what they call the Piranha Investigation, also arrested in that same case was the Chief Financial Officer of WINAIR Roberto Gibbs. Gibbs is the owner of Global Advisory Services. Global Advisory Services was contracted by the Government of St. Maarten to provide workers for the tax and other departments. The Prosecutor's Office said that the company double charged government for the services they provided. Some of the charges levied against Shigemoto and Gibbs are fraud, forgery, money laundering, and not following government rules.
It should be noted that the former Director of Finance Bas Roorda who was fired from his job for breaching government policies is the one that provided information on Shigemoto, Gibbs, Labega, Dest, and Richardson. It is still not clear how the Prosecutor's Office have separated the Piranha investigation from the other persons that Roorda implicated in wrong doings.
