7 News Belize

Kingston Calls Ralph Fonseca’s Name, Saldivar Lives To Fight Another Day
posted (February 6, 2020)
Finally today, on the witness stand in a Utah federal courtroom - Jacob Kingston started detailing his business and political contacts in Belize - all facilitated by Lev Dermen. But, the name he dropped is not what you might expect.

This evening, in the last few minutes of testimony for the day, Kingston said he traveled to Belize several times with Lev Dermen to explore possible involvement with a gambling businesses - both online and physical casino operations. They were also looking into investments for a fuel depot and the reconstruction of a port.

He said those discussions included Ralph Fonseca, described by Kingston as "Belize's Minister of Finance,". Kingston added that he had also met Fonseca at a meeting in Miami.

Now, for a point of clarity, these meetings with Kingston, Dermen and Fonseca were held around 2013 - 5 years after Fonseca was voted out of office in 2008. Additionally, Fonseca was Minister of Finance only briefly from 2003 to August 2004 when the G7 uprising deposed him.

Back to today's testimony, Kingston did not say much about the meetings with Fonseca, but said he ultimately bought a warehouse in Belize that was supposed to be used for proposed gambling operations.

And, right there, just after Kingston testified about those Belize projects, the trial broke for the weekend. Prosecutors say they will provide the jury with more information about Dermen and Kingston's Belize deals on Monday.

Now, right there, that's a huge sigh of relief that could probably be heard from Belmopan al the way to Salt Lake City, because it means John Saldivar lives to fight another day - and that day is Convention day, Sunday. Saldivar is listed in evidence details as having exchanged text messages with Kingston, but the details of that will probably not be known until next week. Saldivar has consistently denied any wrongdoing, and, now, he can maintain that claim on the convention floor on Sunday.

Notably, Kingston also made brief mention of Belize in this morning's testimony. He described meetings Dermen led him into with state and city officials in Los Angeles California - who Dermen had on his payroll. He also added, quote, "We had dinner with ministers from Belize, mayors … I met the president of Turkey through Levan,". End quote.

And that fits with what we have heard that at least one UDP Mayor travelled in at least one occasion with Dermen and Saldivar.

But, right now, all that is in the wind; the bottom line is John Saldivar's name, nor that of any other UDP minister has not been called in Utah, which means it's full speed ahead to Sunday's UDP national convention.

As we have reported, the convention will be closed to the media, but we have learned that the US Embassy has asked to have an observer from its political affairs office inside to monitor the process. We understand the National Party Council agreed to that.

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