Keod Smith
Emails that back propaganda claim
EMAIL correspondence seen by The Tribune appears to corroborate Earlin Williams’ claim that he and others were employed to produce propaganda material.
In an email dated August 25, 2015, entitled “Drop Obie”, Keod Smith asks for an update on the status of a graphic “showing Bacon with shadow of black wings like Satan embracing Obie and Sarkis Izmirlian”.
The purported email further outlines that Mr Williams will provide words for the project and itemises a 30-second advertisement, for Facebook and social media, to end with “renegotiate symbol”.
In the email, Mr Smith also makes the point that the “Westminster parliamentary democracy requires Cabinet Minister to resign when he is at odds with Cabinet”. It is likely that the email is referring to Minister of Tourism Obie Wilchcombe and former Baha Mar owner Sarkis Izmirlian.
In August, 2015, during the government’s winding up petition against Baha Mar, Mr Wilchcombe called for the government to suspend its winding up petition and focus on its role as a mediator in the stalled negotiations. In an exclusive interview with The Tribune, Mr Wilchcombe said he felt that it was not too late to achieve a resolution that would avoid a protracted legal battle.
Those comments were characterised by some as a break from Cabinet protocol that undermined the government’s efforts.
In a Nassau Guardian National Review article on August 31, Managing Editor Candia Dames concluded that Mr Wilchcombe should tender his resignation as minister if he felt that the government’s action was not the best route, or be dismissed by Prime Minister Perry Christie.
According to a Nassau Guardian article on September 8, 2015, Mr Smith called for Mr Wilchcombe to resign for publicly opposing Cabinet’s decision on Baha Mar in a radio advertisement on behalf of “Renegotiate Bahamas”.
By AVA TURNQUEST
Tribune Chief Reporter
aturnquest@tribunemedia.net
A FORMER public relations agent for billionaire Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard has confirmed reports that the Lyford Cay resident and his attorney, former Mount Moriah MP Keod Smith, were involved in efforts to intimidate Supreme Court Justice Indra Charles and harass her son.
Earlin Williams, who spent seven years on the “Nygard/Keod Smith public relations machine”, endorsed reports that Mr Smith travelled to St Lucia to investigate Justice Charles, and further claimed that Mr Smith authorised the stalking of her son.
Mr Williams’ claims come amid speculation over whether Justice Charles has recused herself from the ‘murder for hire’ case filed against Mr Nygard and Mr Smith by several Save The Bays directors and independent plaintiff, Rev CB Moss.
“There’s some information I have and I think I need to keep,” Mr Williams told The Tribune. “There’s no need for me to reveal it. I think it’s already out there in the general public but I don’t want to be smeared with the brush that I was involved in anything untoward which seem to circle, cycle or circumference the child of Justice Charles.
“I would never be involved in something as nefarious as that,” he said. “I would never be involved in something that threatened children, where children who are innocent become cannon fodder for another machine. I thought that was going a little bit too far. That was beyond the pale and I couldn’t understand why Nygard and those had decided to take this tack.
“I didn’t pass an opinion on it because it wasn’t my business, but I don’t want to be associated with it because I have my own grandchildren and my own children and I wouldn’t want anybody to do it to them.”
Private information
The Tribune’s investigation concerning Justice Charles follows a 2016 report published in a St Lucia newspaper, that claimed a Bahamian lawyer, accompanied by a Bahamian police officer, were conducting investigations into the background of a Supreme Court judge. They were reported by St Lucia Today to have been observed conducting “a series of interviews and interrogations at government offices” and that St Lucia authorities had identified the two Bahamians who “paid various officials to supply them with information of a private nature on Mrs Charles”.
Justice Charles, a Guyanese national, spent 12 years in St Lucia as a magistrate and High Court registrar in the late 1980s and 1990s.
Since then, The Tribune has seen copies of St Lucia immigration entry documentation for Mr Smith on September 9, 2016, and Royal Bahamas Police Officer Camala McCoy, who entered the country a day earlier.
In October, Commissioner of Police Ellison Greenslade denied reports that a senior police officer had been sent to St Lucia to assist in the purported probe. He said he had ordered an investigation into the matter.
Emails seen by The Tribune purport to show correspondence between Mr Smith, Mr Williams and Tyrone Olander Jr, of A Culture Shock Media Group. The emails were not confirmed by Mr Williams.
According to its website, A Culture Shock is a Chicago-based marketing and promotion company with extensive experience in the Bahamian market. The company designs and produces the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture’s Bahamas Ambassador Magazine “BAAM”.
In BAAM issue 4, tabled in Parliament last week, Mr Williams is listed as BAAM’s editor, with Teejay Olander as creative director.
In an email dated October 10, 2016, Mr Smith requests for a pdf to be created of a Nassau Guardian article that covered Senator Allyson Maynard-Gibson’s commencement address at Lyford Cay International School in 2015.
Mrs Maynard-Gibson poses for a photo with the LCIS graduates which illustrates the article.
The request is also sent in a WhatsApp correspondence, also purported to be from Mr Smith, in which he asks the recipient to capture the photo accompanying the article and identifies Justice Charles’ son.
Sinister situation
Mr Williams confirmed to The Tribune that he also received the photo with certain instructions, but was adamant that he was not involved in any way.
“I understand that telephone calls were made to certain persons who were asked very close to the child, bam bam bam,” he said, “and I know there was an issue as to the Attorney General herself speaking at the commencement exercise at the Lyford Cay School where the child attended. I thought that was really a low, low, low blow and very unfortunate.
Referring to the photo, he said: “Yeah, that was being passed around. I saw that, that was passed around, this was an exercise that people on that Nygard side were promoting, and I think in today’s social media world where nothing is basically isolated once you begin to go on a trek that you’re following someone’s child.
“You’ve been down to St Lucia following the parent, now you’re in Nassau following the child, it does speak to a sinister macabre situation which doesn’t bode well for where we ought to be as a people.
Mr Williams continued: “To criticise the judge or to legally criticise a legal position is all well and fair, but when we start bothering with the wives and the children and the husbands of the judiciary then we get ourselves into a very, very, very shitty end of the stick and this is where it comes in as to how far is one allowed to go, and what’s the penance for going too far?
“That’s the question that has to be asked, but I don’t want to be in any way considered that I was involved in that felonious episode where Keod and those went to St Lucia and then they began this.”
Mr Williams’ exclusive account focuses on the alleged interference with Justice Charles that he claims took place after he severed ties with Mr Nygard and Mr Smith in November, 2015. He began working with Mr Nygard in 2009, but declined to answer questions about his role prior to their split.
“I probably think I was put out to pasture in the Nygard/Keod Smith public relations machine shortly after November of 2015 when I got the lawyer letter,” Mr Williams said.
“It was emailed to me from Mr Nygard’s attorney’s and also forwarded to me from Keod telling me that Mr Nygard was brokering a ... whatever it is ... a peace or settlement or withdrawal from his engagement and he wanted persons like myself who were involved in his part of the machine to deal with whatever we had coming at us and to, in other words, own up to what we were doing or what we had done.”
Mr Williams said he was also notified by Mr Smith that he would no longer be able to represent him in his libel case, in which he is being sued by Mr Nygard’s Lyford Cay billionaire neighbour Louis Bacon.
“What is happening here is that I’m being asked about my detail and my involvement in some things,” Mr Williams said, “which if I do not deny or clarify, makes it appear as if I was involved and I don’t need that. I don’t need no blight on my record. I run a very popular talk show, I try to keep my nose clean, I’m involved in any number of things.”
Mr Williams said: “I don’t want to be fingered as someone who goes on a campus to bother with somebody’s child. People’s kids and stuff ought not be cannon fodder in an exercise.”
Mr Williams was contacted as part of this newspaper’s investigation into requests for recusal of Supreme Court Justices Rhonda Bain and Indra Charles in matters relating to Mr Nygard, Mr Smith and Save the Bays - formerly the Coalition to Protect Clifton Bay.
Children’s safety
His claims come amid speculation over whether Justice Charles has recused herself from the ‘murder for hire’ case filed against Mr Nygard and Mr Smith by several Save the Bays directors and independent plaintiff, Rev CB Moss.
Justice Charles did not preside over the case on February 16, a date she set to hear motions for an injunction, a strike out action and the addition of an affidavit. Instead, Supreme Court Justice Donna Newton took her place and the matter was adjourned without an explanation.
The Tribune understands Justice Charles asked the Chief Justice to reassign the case.
“You can almost understand why, if it was me,” Mr Williams said, “and I was concerned about the safety of my children, and I saw that was happening. I would have to take another direction, I would have to get out of the way because I can’t expose my children to that.
He continued: “I’m not afraid. I mean I’ve had threats from that other side, real threats about what can happen to you if you do this and that but that is how it is, iron will cut iron, at the end of the day, Nygard has said officially, through his attorneys, admit to what you’re involved in come clean, that’s all I want.
“I received no instructions from him that changes that, and he can’t send me no new instructions, I don’t work for him any more.”
Mr Williams said: “And whatever I’ve done, I’ve done in the pale of the instructions he’s given me, and I felt as if I had a loyalty to him to do such.
“I now wait to go into court on my libel matter and to see how I’m able to defend myself and deal with that.”
Comments
themessenger 7 years, 9 months ago
Despicable acts of this kind in civilized country's would land you in jail, morally bankrupt doesn't even begin to describe them, and would appear with the blessing of we guvment and the COP.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrades! What the hell. Sometimes you just gotta let people talk to see where they been and with whom?
BoopaDoop 7 years, 9 months ago
This dude got issues. He also broke Fred Smith's car glass at Jaws Beach caught on video.
Guy 7 years, 9 months ago
How can it be that those persons involved in this level or darkness continue to roam free??
licks2 7 years, 9 months ago
HIS DAY IS COMING. . .AND SOON. . .THAT KIND OF UNCHECKED BAD BEHAVIOUR IS NEVER CORRECTED TO PLPs!!
birdiestrachan 7 years, 9 months ago
Mr: Greenslade denied reports that a Police was sent to ST Lucia for a probe. I believe him to probe what? it makes no sense. As for the Attorney General speaking at the commencement exercise . She was asked to do so. She cannot decide on her own to speak at any school. If anyone wanted a picture of the woman's child , which I doubt. there are cameras on every cell phone.
realfreethinker 7 years, 9 months ago
birdie birdie,this is a little bit over your head so sit small. At least the corrupt plp was smart enough to not nominate this criminal for St Barnabas
birdiestrachan 7 years, 9 months ago
The ramblings of the FNM"s who can understand? They make no sense.
realfreethinker 7 years, 9 months ago
So you see birdie,what I speak about. This article has nothing tp do with the FNM. This is about the sordid tail of nygard,bacon and the plp. Perry was also trying to get Justice Bain removed from this case.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrades! Does it not pain you that this case is either built around pure political poppycock evidence, or the evidence conveys a sense of the alarming leading role some politicians, foreigners, lawyers and other elite society connected may have played?
We are about to go to the polls to return a government to power, or to vote in a new government. Yet there is no urgency to present the evidence before the courts - so that the public gets to decide, if there is real blame and to whom are the bad players the blame belongs.
Are we about to elect bad players, or reject the innocent - whose reputations are being unfairly dragged through the gutter?
Did something bad happen, or was this all Fake?
ThisIsOurs 7 years, 9 months ago
What reason would anyone have to identify the child of a judge they have a case before? How would you even get down that path to know the exact school the child attended? This man needs to be committed to Sandilands for psychological evaluation before someone ends up dead. That object he threw at Fred Smith's car, with enough force to break the windshield could have hit the man in the back of the head and been fatal. Then rolling around in parliament attacking Kenyatta Gibson. Remember maybe a month ago Wayne Munroe had to physically hold him outside of court? Something is seriously wrong with his mental capacity. Shouldn't the Bar look into this?
Well_mudda_take_sic 7 years, 9 months ago
None other than Crooked Perry "Vomit" Christie is responsible for eveything involving NYGARD, period!
Well_mudda_take_sic 7 years, 9 months ago
This proposed FOIA will never have any teeth for obvious reasons. Sadly the problem is much deeper than we would like to think simply because the correlation between the typical types of voters in our society today and the usual kind of politicians they prefer to elect is much too great. As the saying goes: "Birds of a feather flock together" or, in the more appropriate local vernacular, "scum loves only scum"! Therefore replacing an already well fed and fattened bunch of crooks with a very hungry and malnourished bunch of crooks would likely exacerbate our country's death by a thousand cuts. Like most Bahamians I want to be more optimistic, but unfortunately history shows the single most telling sign of a doomed country is the lack of available political alternatives which usually results in a dictatorship of some kind at the end of the day. Even LBT who already looks well fed is nevertheless hungry and anxious to have access to deals on the side with foreign investors and that shining pot of gold held by our country's government which is filled with our tax dollars a/k/a the Public Treasury! Keep in mind too that our PMs have typically also given away for pennies on the dollar large portions of our Crown Land to benefit themselves and their cronies. The dynamics at play are such that much sun light will never be allowed to shine on the dastardly deeds of the corrupt politicians that "we" voters elect to office.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrades! Aren't you curious to know how much money does the public treasury collect each month in taxes and fees from the wealthy foreigners extended the privilege to live among us -or maybe how little to nothing is collected?
Let's start with Lyford Cay's wealthy. Maybe it's costing the state more to allow them to live among us - than the state actually collects. Like, how much have our courts and law enforcement agencies spent on the wealthy?
We know Izmirlian has contributed lots - likes close to a Billion dollars. What about the rest them fat cats?
Alex_Charles 7 years, 9 months ago
Nygard should be thrown out of the country. But he won't. This is the PLP's Bahamas and it will be their Bahamas for another 5 years too
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
Birdie and Tal, sweet lord have mercy do you not see how big this is? A ex-PLP MP, a shady foreign investor and a Bahamian POLICE OFFICER (!!!) have been colluding with the aim of intimidating a Supreme Court Judge and thereby subverting the course of justice. As part of that effort, they took steps to target the judge's CHILD. This is unprecedented and extremely dangerous. And you are trying to downplay it or question whether it was true??? The Tribune didn't say this, a St. Lucia newspaper and Nygard's own PR man said this. Of course it is true. And yet the prime minister has said nothing about this attempt to destroy the independence of the judiciary, which is the guardian of our democracy and legal system. Lord help us all.
themessenger 7 years, 9 months ago
Tal, let us also not forget that Mr. Williams is no stranger to shady dealings. Let me jog your memory about a company by the name of Netsiwill Holding of which Mr. Williams was the principal shareholder. This was the company formed to facilitate the purchase of fifteen Korean fishing boats, remember dem? Even V A Grey was makin noise cause he get cut out da deal. We all know how dat storey ended,Brudda Earlins silent partner resigning his position as Chairman of BAIC under the first Christie Guvment, dees boys bin in da shade tree business long time and when teefs dem does fall out, well lets jus say dat shit does find its own level.
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
Why would Earlin Williams make this up? If the matter ever goes before the courts, he is likely to get lick with a charge as well...
themessenger 7 years, 9 months ago
Thats my point. I don't think he made it up, the boys dem have had a falling out and brudda Earlin is just covering his ass.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrade Messenger, so many untold stories about the real common folk stars of our Bahamaland stretched island to island, and here we are wasting time time talking about such others.
ThisIsOurs 7 years, 9 months ago
Williams says it's "already in the public", what reason would anyone have to whats app the picture of the child of a judge they have a case before? A child? This is not "nothing". This is extremely serious business. The Bar and the Commissioner should be on this.
gangof4 7 years, 9 months ago
I have a question for Fred Mitchell and his PLP cronies? Why is it that.............
Bruno Rufa, the Canadian condo owner in Freeport, is locked up, deported, denied entry back to the Bahamas and is facing criminal charges for allegedly "engaging in gainful occupation without a work permit"?
But..........
Peter "scum" Nygard, the Canadian designer, (i) pays black Bahamians to dress up in white supremacist KKK outfits at our national annual carnival (Junkanoo); (ii) enlists local "gangster/hitmen" to take out the leadership of one of our ecological/environmental organizations (as witnessed on video); (iii) send his local "boungy" boy (Keod Smith) and an officer of the law (who is gainfully employed by the Bahamian taxpayer) to another country to find "damaging" information on one of our Supreme Court Justices to use against her in his case before her; (iv) employs individuals to "threaten, intimidate and harasses" the son of said Justice; and (v) multiple other well documented criminal, nefarious and sordid activities while a resident of the Bahamas.......yet the only time the immigration department ever visits his house is to pick up a donation!!
I guess Rufa is a real "bad" dude and should be barred from ever coming back to our country!!
Wtf........
alfalfa 7 years, 9 months ago
I guess someone must have paid Smith's fine for him. According to our swift justice guidelines, he would otherwise be in jail, not fighting for a PLP nomination. HA HA.
birdiestrachan 7 years, 9 months ago
So the Attorney General Appointed herself speaker at a commencement address at a school so that she could take a picture with the child. If that makes sense to you folks then go with it. After all you are all "A" students. Quote one can teach knowledge , but not wisdom
sheeprunner12 7 years, 9 months ago
Soooooooo, will Keod Smith be arrested , charged and tried for these acts of judicial intimidation and interference????
ThisIsOurs 7 years, 9 months ago
Nobody said the AG orchestrated the picture. It could have been Big Bird in the picture with the child. The point is a photo was being circulated to identify the CHILD. The AG was in the photo because clearly the Guardian photographer thought she was an interesting subject for the purpose of the article. The child happened to be in the background. Why can't you read?
"The request is also sent in a WhatsApp correspondence, also purported to be from Mr Smith, in which he asks the recipient to capture the photo accompanying the article and identifies Justice Charles’ son."
"Referring to the photo, he said: “Yeah, that was being passed around. I saw that, that was passed around, this was an exercise that people on that Nygard side were promoting, and I think in today’s social media world where nothing is basically isolated once you begin to go on a trek that you’re following someone’s child."
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
That is not what it says Birdie. Read the story... slowly. It says that Keod asked his team of cronies to blow up a picture with the child in it, and presumably to focus on that child in particular. It just so happened that it was a pic with the AG in it.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrades ThisIsOurs & The Messenger, do you think if Minnis is elected prime minister.,he and his attorney general - will actively keep all matters Lyford Cay ongoing?
ThisIsOurs 7 years, 9 months ago
Minnis has nothing to do with influencing court cases. The matter is before the court. No Prime Minister has any say in what the court decides. Right?
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
Tal, and what does that have to do with anything? We will cross the Minnis bridge if and when we get to it. Typical PLP – always ducking, dodging, throwing our red herrings, trying to change the subject. The only relevant question is, what will the Commissioner of Police do about Keod, and in particular the officer who went down to St. Lucia with him? The Commish promised an investigation, now he has the relevant info, what action will he take?
Alex_Charles 7 years, 9 months ago
If you can't see this country is fked then you're blind. Either that or you're too per-occupied working these 32,000 jobs
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
Haha yes! Tal and Birdie working all 32,000. That is why everyone else is still unemployed!
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrades! With every new low hanging story - invites others to shake the new information branches. No telling what, if anything, could drop from the shakin? In fact cause the low hangin fruit, the pickins become that much more easier and tempting.
ThisIsOurs 7 years, 9 months ago
Earlin Williams is singing like a canary. I wouldn't be surprised if the names Toggie and Bobo pop up again
realfreethinker 7 years, 9 months ago
I am sure they will resurface,after all they are the enforcers.
TalRussell 7 years, 9 months ago
Comrade ThisIsOurs, what can happen exactly? But I don't think the Policeman's Commish, had Toggie and Bobo in mind when he was talking how when his Chief of Detectives knocks on the front door of one the the complainants - they does runs out da back door? I don't even remember reading nothing in the Tribune - denying the hauling ass accusation out the back door - did you?
You don't even have make this comedy up, now does you?
Voltaire 7 years, 9 months ago
ThisIsOurs, doesn't it say that Earlin Williams works for the government as well? Boy if he is really singing, all manner of things could come out. Dis ga be long.....
licks2 7 years, 9 months ago
They will simply nolle him. . .or let him go sleep with the fish dem. . ..remember the chancy Tynes case. . .he had "plenty" information of the LOP/PLP mixed up in the drug running out of Normans Cay. . . puff. . .he went into the wind. . .never to be seen again!
birdiestrachan 7 years, 9 months ago
Why use a picture with the Attorney General. Which Williams finds offensive.
It is so easy to take a picture of anyone, all Cell phones can take pictures. it is diabolical . and a chance to put the Attorney General in a bad light. It makes no sense.
themessenger 7 years, 9 months ago
Birdie I'd love to have a picture of you, on every sheet of a roll of toilet paper.
birdiestrachan 7 years, 9 months ago
Typical FNM
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