Former CL Financial honco Carlos John is suing his former boss, former CL Financial chairman, Lawrence Duprey for unpaid loans amounting to $5.1 million. Duprey, who initially accepted liability, is now denying owing John any money and is calling on him to provide proof. But before Duprey can change his defence, he first has to convince Justice Frank Seepersad that he can do so.
When the lawsuit came up for hearing at the Hall of Justice in Port-of-Spain yesterday, Duprey’s lawyer Michael Coppin indicated that his client wanted to withdraw his initial position of having accepted liability but not quantum.
A Nigerian mortician, accused of overstaying his time in TT, will not be deported from this country but instead allowed voluntary departure.
Anthony Agu, a 34-year-old certified embalmer with JE Guide Funeral Home in San Fernando, has been given two weeks in which to leave this country and may reapply through the company for permission to return to resume work.
The decision was handed down yesterday during his immigration tribunal at the Immigration Division’s office in Port-of- Spain yesterday. The tribunal was chaired by special immigration investigator Allan Sookram. Testifying at the tribunal was Beverly Guide-Williams, managing director of the funeral home who said Agu was an employee for over three years.
“Anthony has proven himself to be hard working, honest and has a great work ethic,” she noted, adding that there was a shortage of persons in the field.
She recommended that immigration policies be amended so that employers can recruit specialist foreign workers where there is a shortage in certain fields.
“To be a professional embalmer you have to be training. You don’t have people leaving school wanting to do embalming, you have to have that love,” she said. She also noted that Agu’s experience in facial reconstruction was extremely helpful to relatives who lost loved ones, particularly in car accidents.
“He has the skill to make someone look like they did 10 years before their illness and to do that is very difficult.
It gives closure in the sense that relatives are allowed to see their loved ones for one last time in the way that you know and remember them before their illness,” she said.
Agu arrived in T&T in 2012, after securing a work permit and received five extensions from the Immigration Department.
His last extension on his permit expired in January, last year and he was arrested months later when he sought a renewal of his work permit.
Agu was represented by attorneys Ricky Pandohee and Michael Coppin.
On Tuesday last, Simeon Cottle would have celebrated his second birthday, had he survived larcerations to his head caused during a botched Caesarean Section surgery by Dr Javed Chinnia.
I was no part of that, so how come they can find him innocent without calling in the person to whom an injustice was done? My whole take is simply this, doctors will always stand up for doctors and they will always have each other’s back.
Poor people will always have to suffer,” said a disgusted and angry Cottle.
A report, obtained by Cottle’s attorney Michael Coppin, determined that Dr Chinnia, “did not commit any infamous and/or disgraceful conduct in accordance with Section 24 of the Medical Board Act (1960).” When called on during the meeting, Chinnia said Cottle had a complicated pregnancy with severe pre-eclampsia and had oligohydramnios (a condition in pregnancy characterised by a deficiency of amniotic fluid). He stated that he proceeded with due care in the C-section procedure.
Instead his mother Quelly-Ann Cottle was left shaking her head in stunned disbelief on hearing that the Council of the Medical Board of Trinidad had cleared Dr Chinnia of any wrongdoing arising out of the baby's death.
Describing bank fees for simple things like closing an account, depositing cheques and even an empty envelope in an ATM machine as “supernormal”, Government Senator Michael Coppin yesterday called on First Citizens CEO Karen Darbasie and Republic Bank managing director, Nigel Baptiste, to provide answers.
Darbasie and Baptiste and other bank officials were before a Joint Select Committee of Parliament (JSC) appointed to inquire into finance and legal affairs.
Coppin, JSC vice-chairman, seemed particularly concerned about high bank fees, saying the First Citizens charges were “supernormal”.
RIO CLARO businessman Ashmead Mohammed has partially won his lawsuit against two media outlets over a series of reports which labelled him as an Islamic State (ISIS) fighter.
His lawsuit was filed against the Trinidad Express newspaper and CCNTV6.
In a ruling in the Port of Spain High Court yesterday, Justice Avason Quinlan-Williams ruled that the 2014 reports were libellous, however, she also held that the Reynolds defence – the test point for responsible journalism – advanced by the media outlet was applicable in this case.
Mohammed has already indicated his intention to appeal.
He operates an import distribution company, and said his name was slandered and he lost all his business interests in Canada. He was a Canadian resident at the time of the reports which alleged he went to Syria and joined ISIS and his immigration status was revoked.
In their defence, the media outlets, which fall under the parent company One Caribbean Media (OCM), claimed they did not directly refer to Mohammed in the reports.
In her ruling, Quinlan-Williams said while there was sufficient public interest in the reports, and that the companies’ journalists performed their duties fairly, Mohammed was the subject of the reports. Since there was no clear winner in the case, the judge ordered that each side bear its own costs.
He was represented by Farid Scoon and Michael Coppin, while the companies were represented by Faarees Hosein.
The Heliconia Foundation For Young Professionals has been granted leave to apply for judicial review against Mr. Devant Maharaj, Minister of Food Production.
In the order dated 25th August 2015 Madame Justice Margaret Y. Mohammed granted the Foundation and the Foundation’s Vice President Finance Mr. Vyash Nandlal permission to seek relief for the failure, refusal and undue delay of Minister Maharaj in answering questions relating to the number of persons terminated, not renewed and the number of new persons employed by the Ministry of Food Production from June 2010 to November 2014 as well as the reasons for their termination and non-renewal and permission to seek an order of mandamus to compel the Minister to provide the information requested in the Freedom of Information Requests dated November 26, 2014 and April 17, 2015. The Order of Madame Justice Mohammed also grants the Applicants permission to seek a declaration that they are entitled to the documents, a declaration that the continued failure and or refusal by the Minister is illegal and amounts to a breach of the Freedom of Information Act, an order to provide the Applicants the information free of charge and costs for the application.
On August 14, 2015 the Foundation filed two applications at the High Court of Judicature asking the Court for leave to judicially review the actions of the Attorney General Mr. Garvin Nicholas and Minister of Food Production Mr. Devant Maharaj for the failure and undue delay of the Ministry of the Attorney General and the Ministry of Food Production in responding to numerous Freedom of Information Requests.
This action by the Foundation comes on the heels of 15 pre-action letters sent in May 2015 against Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar and responsible Ministers in which the Foundation complained of the government’s systematic failure to respond to questions on the number of persons terminated, not renewed and the number of new persons employed by the Ministry of the Attorney General and the Ministry of Food Production from June 2010 to November 2014 as well as the reasons for their termination and non-renewal.
The Foundation’s evidence is in the form of affidavits and accompanying exhibits filed by President of the Foundation Mr. Michael Coppin and Vice-President Mr. Vyash Nandlal (who is also joined as an applicant in the application against the Minister of Food Production) and outline in detail the chronology of the purported breaches by the Minister of Food Production from November 2014 to August 2015.
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