Denyse Renne

The 45-year-old son of a se­nior gov­ern­ment min­is­ter has re­fused to com­ment on the case law en­force­ment au­thor­i­ties in the Unit­ed States are build­ing against him.Con­tact­ed in Mi­a­mi on Fri­day for a com­ment on the mat­ter, he said, "I have no in­ter­est in speak­ing with you...but have a good day."He then hung up.An­oth­er call to the res­i­dence went unan­swered.

The cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing the case are cloaked in se­cre­cy and sources have said both the Fed­er­al Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions (FBI) and the In­ter­nal Rev­enue Ser­vices (IRS) are deal­ing with it through a sealed in­dict­ment. Such a seal, sources say, can re­main in­tact for years, once in­ves­ti­ga­tions are on­go­ing.

Un­der a sealed in­dict­ment, no in­for­ma­tion about the case goes pub­lic un­til the pros­e­cu­tion is sat­is­fied all the ev­i­dence to sup­port the al­le­ga­tions against the im­pli­cat­ed par­ty has been gath­ered to take be­fore the courts. With the in­dict­ment be­ing sealed, pub­lic data­bas­es–such as the Pub­lic Ac­cess to Courts Elec­tron­ic Records (PAC­ER) in the US–will not record or reg­is­ter the case in its ju­di­cial data­base.

PAC­ER is pro­vid­ed by the fed­er­al ju­di­cia­ry in keep­ing with its com­mit­ment to pro­vid­ing pub­lic ac­cess to court in­for­ma­tion via a cen­tralised ser­vice.

The seal al­so means the pub­lic does not have ac­cess to doc­u­ments or in­for­ma­tion, even about such ba­sic facts as the iden­ti­ties of the pros­e­cu­tion, judge, de­fen­dants or ev­i­dence to be led and the charges. Sources say in­ves­ti­ga­tors are pur­su­ing mon­ey laun­der­ing, tax eva­sion and fraud con­vic­tions.The min­is­ter's son, sources say, re­mains un­der house ar­rest while the in­ves­ti­ga­tors gath­er their ev­i­dence.

Calls to the US Em­bassy, the Unit­ed States De­part­ment of Jus­tice and the FBI all yield­ed the same re­sponse: "We de­cline to com­ment."

No com­ment from PM

It was on­ly last week that Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, dur­ing a tour of po­lice sta­tions, said she was seek­ing an­swers about the ex­clu­sive Sun­day Guardian re­port about the case against the min­is­ter's son be­ing un­der a sealed in­dict­ment.Per­sad-Bisses­sar said then: "I would be very con­cerned about any­body's son and in­deed if it was one of my min­is­ters."

She said, how­ev­er, that she had "no in­for­ma­tion on any min­is­ter's son who is in any cir­cum­stances abroad. I have no such in­for­ma­tion, ad­vice or knowl­edge. I have asked." ����Fur­ther checks by Sun­day Guardian as to the en­ti­ties which Per­sad-Bisses­sar ques­tioned went unan­swered.Spe­cial ad­vis­er for pub­lic en­gage­ments at the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter Lisa Ghany when con­tact­ed and asked specif­i­cal­ly whom Per­sad-Bisses­sar spoke to, asked that the ques­tions be e-mailed.

Sun­day Guardian com­plied and e-mailed the ques­tions on Wednes­day. Con­tact­ed on Fri­day, Ghany said, "I am not at lib­er­ty to com­ment on those ques­tions."Am­bas­sador to the Unit­ed States Dr Neil Parsan al­so asked that the ques­tions be e-mailed. Sun­day Guardian again com­plied.

In an e-mailed re­sponse, Parsan said, "No com­mu­ni­ca­tion from US au­thor­i­ties has been re­ceived by the TT Em­bassy, Wash­ing­ton DC, and the Con­sulates in New York and Mi­a­mi." He said it was nor­mal pro­ce­dure that the Em­bassy in Wash­ing­ton be in­formed of TT na­tion­als who were ar­rest­ed and charged in the USA, but this usu­al­ly oc­curred when those in­di­vid­u­als are to be de­port­ed.

"The Em­bassy is gen­er­al­ly in re­ceipt of full doc­u­men­ta­tion re per­sons de­tained when de­por­ta­tion pro­ceed­ings have been ini­ti­at­ed. Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­als are en­cour­aged to con­tact the Em­bassy or Con­sulates via tele­phone or e-mail in like mat­ters.

"No such com­mu­ni­ca­tion has oc­curred in this mat­ter," he said.Asked specif­i­cal­ly whether the Prime Min­is­ter or any gov­ern­ment of­fi­cial had con­tact­ed him to make in­quiries in­to the mat­ter, or whether he (Parsan) him­self at­tempt­ed to con­tact the IRS, FBI, or even the min­is­ter's son af­ter the ar­ti­cle ap­peared, Parsan failed to give a re­sponse.

Ques­tions to the PM

Ques­tions posed by­Sun­day Guardian to the PM:

1) Has the Prime Min­is­ter, of­fi­cial­ly or oth­er­wise, re­quest­ed in­for­ma­tion from the US, as it per­tains to re­ports of a min­is­ter's son be­ing held in the US un­der a se­cret in­dict­ment? If yes, when was such re­quest made?

2) Has the PM been con­tact­ed by any US gov­ern­men­tal of­fi­cial/agency with re­gards to a min­is­ter's son be­ing held in the US un­der a se­cret in­dict­ment?

3) Has the PM at­tempt­ed to con­tact ei­ther the FBI or IRS on re­ports that a min­is­ter's son is be­ing held in the US un­der a se­cret in­dict­ment?

4) Fol­low­ing re­ports that (names called) have been ar­rest­ed and are as­sist­ing of­fi­cers with in­ves­ti­ga­tions in the US, has the PM made any con­tact with the men to as­cer­tain their wel­fare/sta­tus?