Customs official arrested on suspicion of breach of trust
The police today (Tuesday, February 14) arrested a Customs official on suspicion of breach of trust.
The Royal Virgin Islands Police Force (RVIPF) gave that indication late Tuesday evening but did not disclose the identity of the person in question.
It said: “The RVIPF executed warrants in relation to an ongoing investigation into irregularities with HM Customs. A 56-year-old male was today arrested on suspicion of Breach of Trust by a public official and subsequently released pending further information.”
No other information was provided. While the police did disclose the identity of the Customs official, BVI News was reliably informed that the person in question holds a very senior rank in the department.
This news comes months after Commissioner of His Majesty’s Customs, Wade Smith was placed on administrative leave. Authorities are yet to give any public explanation for the decision to bench Smith in the first place. However, the timing of the leave came months after the release of the controversial Commission of Inquiry (COI) report that resulted in the RVIPF opening several criminal investigations into multiple government departments and agencies.
COI Commissioner, Sir Gary Hickinbottom had said in his report that he could not exclude the possibility that corruption may exist among officers in HM Customs and the Immigration Department.
“The environment in each – but particularly the former – is conducive to such,” Sir Gary said. As a remedy, Sir Gary recommended that “independent vetting of all current HM Customs and Immigration Officers at all levels needs to be undertaken on an urgent basis.”
Over the last weeks and months, multiple past and present public officers were charged with breach of trust concerning how they performed their duties during their time with the government. Among those charged are former Education Minister Myron Walwyn and the former Director of the International Affairs Secretariat in the Premier’s Office, Najan Christopher.
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The place need cleaning up.
This place feel real stupid boy. Since head coach off the scence
So we dont know who the dead man is and we don know who this customs man is either
This is the only charge they know and still don’t know? They will lose all these stupid cases that they are bringing against people. They make the dog sick now.
This is wickedness and revenge just because wade has them white racist in court
The chickens are coming home to roost
Sounds like a tall story.
Sad
Head coach and or mother and son will take a deal and spit what they know…They may not give up everything they know but they have to give up some…You all know that much tougher, richer and more connected criminals bow under federal pressure, So, as they spit what they know the information is fed to the Governor..The Governor and Britain know a lot more than we think. They are just shock of how blind and naive we are..more arrest in the pipe.
Ayo stop playing, LMAO, somebody on ah roll, hahahaha
Drain the swamp. No tolerance on corruption.
I mi mining my business keep me out of ur messy people thing
I do not trust those untruthful UK officers period. Between them and that incompetent DPP they will cost the taxpayers a lot of money. Watch you see the DPP will spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to bring in white UK lawyers to prosecute the cases for her and still lose. This is the real breach of trust.
If you check the list of arrests and charges made over the last 24 months, you can see that this is across all departments, all governmental bodies and all levels of employment.
From Premier to Secretarial Services to Customs Officers, it’s one corrupt mess.
It will take years to clean up corruption, mismanagement and criminal activities in the BVI.
That’s a fact!
So did anyone reach out to Wade Smith to confirm that it was him that was arrested yesterday morning? If you are going to splash JW over the pages when he got arrested we might as well do the same thing for Wade-Smith.
Breach of Trust is a wide ranging , non specific, holding charge. It allows the police to prevent the accused from returning to work while they continue investigations. There will for sure be much more specific and detailed charges against a number of politicians and civil servants soon enough.
How old is Wade Smith? Asking for a friend.
Caged Canaries Concert ? in Miami
You dont know how much the law abiding citizens go thru under the hands of our fellow so call local rouge leaders
when the saint andrew was beating his tummy like Moby dick , didn’t bhe know what he was getting himself and family into ? / well he has jepodized his whole family lives over POWER AND AND MONEY , according to those drug cartels , you mess wid my money ,I mess wid yo life ,so right now , he is between a rock and a hard place