Email

Print

Switching gears now, it’s been about a month now since news broke that Reynaldo Verde, Belize’s #2 taxman was arrested by the FBI on allegations of extortion. 

Since then, the details of the explosive allegations against him have been circulated in a 9 page criminal complaint.  

The FBI says that it has a recording of him trying very hard to shake down American Real Estate Developer, Chris Williams. It is alleged Verde requested a half-a-million-dollar bribe to make William’s multi-million-dollar tax arrears disappear. 

Now, Verde’s boss is the Minister of Finance who is also the Prime Minister.  We asked him to comment yesterday:

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister
"It’s regrettable, but I hope - and when you look at the charges, and the details supporting the charges, it doesn’t look good. But, I would hope that people would recognize that the vast majority of public officers are honest and conscientious. Of course, there are some that aren’t, but I don’t think that we should use the apparent wrongdoing of some as a brush with which to daub the entirety of the Public Service. By and large, I think we have good, hardworking, honest, conscientious public officers."

Reporter
"The Tax Department said that they are going to investigate Mr. Verde in its own way. Do you believe that whatever cases he dealt with in the past should also be investigated?"

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow
"No, those should be looked at. If there is an allegation that this man was a shakedown artist - without commenting on whether the allegation has merit, is unfounded or is something that is true - certainly, an effort should be made to look at all instances. There may be other people who will come forward to say, look, I was the victim of a shakedown, and those sorts of things should be examined."

Verde remains in a federal jail while he waits for the court procedure to slowly wend its way to a conclusion.