CUSTOMS Enforcement Team Director Omar Guyah will be asking the Supreme Court to award him a minimum US$1 million (approximately J$115 million) in compensation, following his acquittal on criminal charges last Friday.

Guyah was charged with 14 counts of breaches of the Customs Act, conspiracy to defraud, breaches of the Corruption Prevention Act and simple larceny.

Guyah confirmed to the Jamaica Observer in an interview shortly after the matter against him was thrown out in the St Andrew Resident Magistrate’s Court by judge Simone Wolfe Reece that the State will be asked to compensate him for the pain and suffering that he has endured over the past three years.

“Without question we can say that we are proceeding with a suit,” Guyah said in the interview exclusive to the Sunday Observer.

“That suit will proceed although he is still an employee,” Capt Paul Beswick, one of Guyah’s attorneys, emphasised. “There is no inconsistency in suing your employer and continuing to discharge your functions and duties to the people of Jamaica.”

Guyah, along with fellow customs employee Cordella Brown, was arrested on March 9, 2012 for allegedly breaching the Customs Act.

He spent a week in police custody until he was released on bail, the conditions of which were rigid, his lawyers said.

His attorneys are planning to argue that his fundamental rights were breached by the State, his credibility severely battered and his ability to go on secondment to a world-renowned customs agency brutally compromised.

Guyah was given half his salary while the matter was in front of the court, and was not allowed to visit any property operated by Jamaica Customs. He also did not work for any other agency during the period.

“We will be seeking a restoration of his life, as best as possible, as it was before. There are some realities that we have to accept and we don’t know how it’s going to work,” Beswick said.

“He should have gone on secondment at World Customs in Brussels, Belgium. He actually got the job, went there on management training for the job which entails enforcement, border protection, rules and valuation and standards and he would work hand-in-hand with the WTO (World Trade Organisation) to, among other things, make the system more efficient and less painful.

“He agreed a five-year contract, would have earned euros and was preparing to leave when this matter came up,” Beswick said.

Although all the paperwork has not been completed, the next move of reintegrating Guyah in Customs lies ahead. Jamaica Customs was gazetted as an executive agency in March 2013 and is now referred to as the Jamaica Customs Agency.

Even before that change, Guyah’s lawyers tried desperately to prevent the organisation from filling his post, but that did not happen. Now, there may be confusion regarding how he will return to the day-to-day operations of the organisation that collects billions in revenue on behalf of the Government.

“An application for an injunction was made to prevent the new Jamaica Customs Agency from putting anyone in the position that he held,” Beswick said. “The duties that they listed on the job description for deputy CEO of Border Protection were almost equivalent to everything that he was doing. While that application was in train, the CEO of the Jamaica Customs Agency filled the position after he was served.

“They in fact succeeded on an application that we made to injunct them from filling the equivalent of his post in the new Jamaica Customs Agency, so that leaves us, leaves everybody, in a dilemma, because he still, and they acknowledge it, remains the director of enforcement. He was transferred from the Jamaica Customs Department to the Jamaica Customs Agency in his existing capacity, but they have nevertheless gone ahead and got someone, created another position and put someone in place over him. So that is going to create a difficulty as to how it will be resolved.

“The defence turned up in court to hear the matter before Justice [Bryan] Sykes, but the application could not proceed,” Beswick said.

“Even this exoneration… while it’s exactly what we wanted, it can’t pay me back or allow me to get back. I will have to find the stamina to get through this,” Guyah said.

One of the other points that the defence is arguing is that Guyah’s rights to see his longtime partner while she was gravely ill in the United States were violated.

“There were so many injustices and indecencies that he has faced, one of them was when he was under these restrictions, his life partner died in the United States and he had been refused the opportunity on three occasions to visit her before she died,” Beswick said.

“Finally, a judge, after she died, decided that she would allow him to visit for the funeral. So a court order was made, his passport returned to him, he was told that he could go and he is to return the passport by a certain date,” Beswick said.

“I was sitting in the plane and armed policemen came and took me off, saying I breached my bail condition by attempting to leave the country,” Guyah jumped in. “My passport was taken and I was taken to a room where I had to show all my documents proving that I was legal to travel between October 16 and November 8, as I was granted permission to leave the island by Magistrate Judith Pusey. The court signed it, and the chief immigration officer signed it and they still took me off the plane and delayed the flight. It was just traumatising. I eventually returned the passport on November 5, 2013.”