OCG hands over NHT scam evidence to Fraud Squad

Friday, January 15, 2010

CONTRACTOR General Greg Christie Monday handed over 74 pieces of evidence to the Fraud Squad as investigations continue into a scam involving four fake 'contractors' who milked $87 million in contracts from the National Housing Trust (NHT).

The elaborate scam was brought to public attention last week after death threats were made against an OCG official who is the lead investigator into the scheme believed to be a criminal conspiracy to siphon funds from the award of Government contracts by the NHT.

At the time, Christie said the conspiracy involved four employees of the NHT and five contractors, four of whom, he said, were bogus. The Contractor General also revealed that one of the four bogus contractors wasa full-time social studies schoolteacher at a prominent St Andrew high school, while another was an information technology specialist.

Christie said one NHT employee was listed as a full-time employee on the application documentation of the fifth contractor for the past four years, while two other NHT workers were listed as full-time employees of two of the sham contractors.

Monday, in a statement to the media, Christie said the "74 exhibits of evidence" -- which are among those which have so far been assembled by his office -- had been formally handed over to the investigative team at the Fraud Squad, headed by Inspector Horace Forbes.

The evidence included originals of the complete contents of the official National Contracts Commission for the five contractors, reports from several meetings between OCG officials and representatives of the five contractors, reports on four meetings between the OCG and the four staff members of the NHT, and reports on the nine meetings between OCG senior officials and certain OCG staff members. He also produced audio recordings of the entire proceedings of all the meetings.

Christie said that following the conclusion of his investigations, a full report would be submitted to Parliament and other relevant state authorities.

Since the disclosure, the NHT announced that it had sent the four employees implicated in the contracts corruption probe on leave until the matter was resolved.