St. Maarten Private Eye

House of cards

Below you will find two emails that were sent to SXM PE on Tuesday (26th June) evening, they were also sent to large crowd of politicians, govt officials and media organisations throughout the Caribbean, Holland and the US.

The emails detail accounts of fraud and crimes by an immigration officer, her husband and her sister, who happens to be a police officer. We have decided to publish the emails below (with names initials) without further comment. We are not interested in who it came from, but rather in what they say, that the police force are avoiding investigating their own.

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Email 1

Greetings Sint Maarten Police, Various Government Officers and an Assortment of News Agencies in Sint Maarten, Curacao, Dominica and the Netherlands!

As promised, it is with great frustration that I pen this letter describing police corruption pertaining to immigration fraud and two other scandals which I have been unable to get the St. Maarten police to investigate for more than three weeks now.

A little more than three weeks ago, the St. Maarten police department was made aware of an immigration scandal involving an immigration officer and her family who were accepting bribes in exchange for coordinating illegal entry into Sint Maarten, Netherland Antilles.

I’m not a participant, I haven’t tangibly or in-tangibly benefitted from these activities and I wasn’t aware of these matters until recently. I overheard comments made by one of the participants in the company of his friends, which J.A later confirmed were correct.

It seems that L H, an immigration officer in the Sint Maarten airport, has been accepting money to allow illegal entry into Sint Maarten for several years. LH was assisted by her former husband, JA who works for GEBE and her sister who is a detective in the Sint Maarten police force.

As I understand it, LH wanted to build a nice house, which she partly financed with cash bribes to allow illegal immigrants through the Sint Maarten immigration checkpoint.

Her husband coordinated the activities and accepted the money, he works for GEBE as a technician repairing outages and maintaining the Sint Maarten electrical grid. While he drives around the island on behalf of the electrical company, he is able to speak to a great many of the resident’s who may want to use his wife’s services for their family members who are still in other countries.

Many foreigners have family back home who would like to visit Sint Maarten for any number of reasons but are not able to do so because of visa requirements. This immigration officer was able to turn a tidy sum allowing these people to illegally enter Sint Maarten.

For several years, many people from other Caribbean locations paid JA to have his wife to illegally pass people through the airport immigration office. JA would collect some of the money up-front and be paid the rest after his wife passed the illegal immigrant through the airport. In many cases, according to conversations between JA to his friends, the illegal immigrants would refuse to pay the other half of the money.

The perpetrators are unable to pursue the unpaid bribe money through normal channels because they are earned that money while performing an illegal service. LH's sister is a detective on the Sint Maarten police force, it’s my understanding that she assisted in collecting some of the delinquent payments.

It’s not known how many people amongst the police or the airport staff were aware of these activities. However, many of the GEBE staff witnessed JA solicit for his wife’s services. Other people who should be interviewed concerning this matter would be JA's close associates. Two which come to mind would be an individual named “Duran” and an individual named “Eddy”. JA lived with his mother-in-law in LH's large shared house.

Inspector Barday was assigned to this case by Commission Duran, although there does not seem to have been any investigation into this matter during the last three weeks. Apparently, no witnesses have been interviewed and the matter seems not to have progressed. Furthermore, it has not been possible to even obtain a response from the Sint Maarten police department concerning this matter despite email “read receipts” which indicate that they have been receiving correspondence concerning this matter.

It was suggested to both parties that they might want to review all of the case histories which have been documented by the detective who is involved. Presumably, a small number of the identified non-Dutch nationals will be participants in this fraud. Most of the people who were coerced into payment for the immigration fraud would probably not be listed in her activity logs, but there may be some circumstances which would mandate a listing in the activity logs under a fake subject.

It is believed that JA may have fled to Dominica, where his mother and sister live.

When this matter was first discussed with Inspector Barday several weeks ago, it was mentioned that JA and LH recently went through a nasty divorce. JA was upset that LH kept all of their combined illegal earnings, which were partially invested into the house they shared together.

LH and her family live in a large shared house which was constructed over a several year period using predominately undocumented cash payments. This is an easy investigation because there is so much clear evidence of mysterious money.

As a by-product of LH's theft from JA, he was encouraged to speak with Inspector Barday and provide the police with specific details of the immigration fraud. Inspector Barday requested specific dates, times and people who were involved as a big step forward in this matter. Unfortunately, JA refused to make contact with the police voluntarily. Presumably, this indicates his direct involvement in the fraudulent activities was as a willing participant.

I suppose that these people are innocent until proven guilty. Of course, I don’t understand why the police wouldn’t be happy to demonstrate that the cited people (including their own police officer) are innocent with an investigation. For that matter, wouldn’t it be nice if the Sint Maarten police also investigated the other two scandals they have refused to hear about?

And here’s where the big long list of recipients comes in...

While I have been unable to get the Sint Maarten police department to investigate this matter (or even to accept the details of the other two scandals), shining a bright on light on whatever they want to keep hidden should speed up the progress of this investigation and make them accept the details of the other two scandals. Perhaps in the future, new procedures will be implemented which will eliminate the need for such public disclosures before the Sint Maarten police will investigate immigration fraud and the other two scandals.

The other two scandals are equally dazzling, one involves a Sint Maarten attorney and the other scandal involves a large Sint Maarten company which has not suffered any consequences from an assortment of illegal activities, seemingly due to political favoritism.

I ask that the news media companies which have received a carbon copy of this email not publicize these other two scandals, as I have not been able to provide any details to the Sint Maarten police force yet. However, I would ask for your assistance in forcing the Sint Maarten police force into receiving these details and pursuing these investigations towards the foregone conclusion. Both of these matters will be easy and fast to investigate, the bank records and other documents are simple to validate on one hand and the accounting records and an immigration raid will make quick work of the other matter.

I close this letter by saying that I have performed my civic duty in this regard, which unfortunately I consider only one third finished. Hopefully, I will be able to finally unburden myself concerning the other two scandals to a receptive Sint Maarten police department soon.

Recipient List:

Governor F.E. Richards, St Maarten
Director of Cabinet, St. Maarten
Head of PR & Protocol, St. Maarten
General Policy Advisor, St. Maarten
Chief Prosecutor, St. Maarten
Netherlands Antillen Affairs, Consul for Netherlands Antillean
Police Department, St. Maarten
The Daily Herald, St. Maarten
AVS News, St. Maarten
SMN News, St. Maarten
SXM Private Eye, St. Maarten
La Prensa, Curacao
Amigoe, Curacao
International Herald Tribune, London, Hong Kong, New York
Miami Herald International Edition, US
Government of the Netherland Antilles, Netherland Antilles
Bar Association of Curacao
Government of Curacao, Curacao
Marpin Telecoms, Dominica
Government of Dominica, Dominica
The Chronicle, Dominica
Inside World, US
The Sun, Dominica
Dominica Broadcasting Corporation, Dominica
The Times, Dominica
The Tropical Star, Dominica
Kairi FM Radio, Dominica
News Dominica, Dominica
Cana News, Caribbean
Radio Nederland Wereldomroep, Netherlands
NOS: Nederlandse Omroep Stichting, Netherlands
BVN-TV, Netherlands
EO, Netherlands
HUMAN, Netherlands
Boeddhistische Omroep Stichting, Netherlands
IKON, Netherlands
Max, Netherlands
Joodse Omroep, Netherlands
NIO, Netherlands
NCRV, Netherlands
OHM, Netherlands
Publieke Omroep, Netherlands
Teleac, Netherlands
STER, NetherlandsVARA, Netherlands
VPRO, Ntherlands
Adformatie, Netherlands
AGD (Niewssite Van Het Agrarish Dagblad), Netherlands
AD (Algemeen Dagblad), Netherlands
Blik op Nieuws, Netherlands
BN DeStem, Netherlands
Dagblad De Limburger, Netherlands
De Gelderlander, Netherlands
De Gooi-en Eemlander, Netherlands
De Pers, Netherlands
De Telegraaf, Netherlands
De Twentsche Courant Tubantia, Netherlands
De Volkskrant, Netherlands
Eindhovens Dagblad, Netherlands
Elsevier, Netherlands
Grenzeloos, Netherlands
de Stentor, Netherlands
Groninger Internet Courant, Netherlands
Haarlems Dagblad, Netherlands
Noordhollands Dagblad, Netherlands
Leeuwarder Courant, Netherlands
Leidsch Dagblad, Netherlands
Limburgs Dagblad, Netherlands
Nieuwsklok, Netherlands
NDC, Netherlands
Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant, Netherlands
Schuttevaer, Netherlands
Trouw de Verdieping, Netherlands

Email 2

Hello Sint Maarten Police Department,

A few points....

1. Thank you for your call, I appreciate talking to you and finally getting a response. It’s a little fucked up how much effort was required to get a response, but lets be positive that maybe you will finally do your job.

2. It is nice to know that I now understand how to get a response from you. Thank you, it seems that I just need to spread what I want a response about around the world a little bit first. I wonder if a bigger mailing list with more international news media and even local Sint Maarten residents will produce a bigger response? Unfortunately, I suspect that time will tell.

3. It is disappointing that most of our telephone call was about you trying to protect the police officer who is involved. I really like that angle. It took me weeks to get a response and you spend most of the investigation now just making yourselves look better? What a nice coverup, thanks for making the story really juicy.

4. Is it standard police procedure to hang up the telephone when we get to the parts you don’t want to hear? Strange, how do you get any actual investigating done? I find it very odd that we just talked about how you are trying to clear your officer and then you hang up.

5. Do you actually expect anybody to believe that you can’t operate an email account? I do actually find that possible after talking to you but that’s not a compliment. I find your comments that the "name" of my email address was confusing as the basis for why you ignored me a little bizarre. Also, your comments that whoever opened the email in the police station might be the wrong department is a little pathetic too. Are you suggesting that you are not responsible for any email you receive because you are too disorganized to process it properly?

6. Your investigation had better be more than trying to protect the detective who collected the unpaid bribe money. If all you are going to do is try and cover your own ass, I can really spread that around good. I always give people a chance to fail, as I did with you earlier. You should know that my ability to shine a bright light of your coverup is greater than your ability to escape from your problem.

7. I told you several times that I wanted to talk to you about the other two scandals. We never got around to that. How is the police or government involved in those issues that you are trying to hide from them so much? I smell another international email coming... You just can’t be nice to some people.

8. Why are you trying to avoid the other two scandals so much? I’ve sent you email after email and now I’ve spoken with you on the telephone three times and I still can’t give you the details. Just so that we are clear, I’m am not going to play that game. You will probably be able to get the details from the newspaper tomorrow. Try covering that up.

In conclusion, I guess you want to make this more difficult than it needs to be. That’s unfortunate, but at some point you will investigate all three scandals. It will be interesting to see how much pressure it takes before that happens.

On the positive side, it could always be worse. At least it’s only a detective who is dirty this time. Although the fact that Mr. Loor had problems when he was in Immigration is a nice twist. Shame about your Police Commissioner in jail now, I can understand your desire to escape from this problem very much. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen.

Oh, one last thing. Enclosed is the "read receipt" from one of the emails I sent before. I suppose you can say that you are too screwed up to have properly handled my email but you can’t say you never got them.

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This is a receipt for the mail you sent to
at 6/12/2007 3:10 PM

This receipt verifies that the message has been displayed on the recipient's
computer at 6/13/2007 9:14 AM

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