The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

LAWMAKERS united yesterday to support the Proceeds of Crime Bill and the Financial Transactions Reporting Bill, laws meant to clamp down on corruption and crime, although Progressive Liberal Party leaders warned against overreach.

The Proceeds of Crime Bill was sparked by weaknesses identified in the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force's assessment of the country's anti-money laundering defences last year.

Among other things, the bill will allow authorities to target the wealth of civil servants, politicians, their relatives and suspected criminals who live beyond their legal income.

Several parliamentarians yesterday emphasised that, if enforced, the bill should allay concerns Bahamians have about elected officials who leave office with substantially greater wealth than they had on entering office.

National Security Minister Marvin Dames said: "The nuts and bolts of these far reaching and significant bills is to launch an effective assault against the criminal networks operating throughout our country, no matter where they may be operating, in the communities, in the financial centre, across jurisdictions or on the deep web. Where the Tracing and Forfeiture of Proceeds of Drug Trafficking Act of 1986 did not go far enough, the Proceeds of Crime (Bill) made some inroads and what those acts were not successful in accomplishing, this bill will achieve and put our nation on par with global financial and anti-corruption strategies."

PLP leaders, however, questioned provisions in the bill that would allow the property of people not convicted of a crime to be forfeited. They said this could result in possible constitutional violations. While the bill has provisions addressing conviction-based civil forfeiture, it also contains provisions for non-conviction based civil forfeiture, empowering the courts to grant an order of civil forfeiture in relation to properties when they conclude, "on a balance of probabilities," that such property is "proceeds of criminal conduct, an instrumentality or terrorist property."

Exuma and Ragged Island MP Chester Cooper said: "There is a provision where a confiscation order may be had if a person is charged. I implore the government to seriously look into whether this section can stand up to constitutional scrutiny. The threshold for charging someone is not very high. We should not, in our haste, be so quick to leave behind the basic tenet of law that a person is presumed innocent until guilt is proven. The provisions in this section could potentially backfire and cause significant hardship if we get it wrong and lead to costly lawsuits against the government, for which the Bahamian people will ultimately foot the bill. We must take care that this and other provisions of the bill do not infringe on the constitution rights of Bahamians."

Health Minister Dr Duane Sands, however, said people have used the principle of innocence until proven guilty as a cloak to engage in wrongdoing.

"Because we have no proof or because the law says people are innocent until proven guilty," he said, "and evidence is hard to come by, we watch as an ordinary fella, we knew him since he was a boy and he was never the brightest light in the chandelier. He works at a regular job or maybe he doesn't work at all. Interestingly, he drives a luxury car that someone making ten times his salary cannot afford. And he lives in a million dollar home or has a sixty foot yacht. His parents are not rich. He didn't inherit from his wealthy uncle. He never struck gold or oil in his back yard but he is living large... The presumption that one is innocent 'til proven guilty, a principle, a truth on which civil society is based, while a noble and romantic concept, has provided a cover for all types of criminal activity. And persons in this country have exploited that premise to do all manner of evil including raping, stealing and killing. The point is perpetrators, criminals know that while they may be guilty the system is too weak, too stressed, too slow, too corrupt to prove it."