Five persons have been charged with conspiring to commit a felony following the police‘s probe into a recently discovered stealing of money by use of forged bank cheques claiming to be issued by the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA).
Romeschand Singh, 40, of Grove East Bank Demerara, Shareesa Tappin, 26, of Clifford Avenue Georgetown, Kamalram Persaud, 25, of Golden Grove, East Bank Demerara, Devindra Moteeram, 24, of East La Penitence and Anush Khan, 24, of Golden Grove/Diamond, were arraigned before Senior Magistrate Leron Daly at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts.
Together, the four men are charged with two conspiracy to commit a felony. The charges state that they conspired with each other and persons unknown to forge two cheques claiming to be from two known banks, amounting to $19M, in favor of Tappin, purporting to show that it was issued by GRA.
Tappin faces two separate uttering a forged document charges and was remanded, while the men have been released on $300,000 bail for each charge.
The matter was adjourned until June 21.
It was reported that the Guyana Bank of Trade and Industry (GBTI) recently processed $23.8M in fake cheques from GRA.
GRA Commissioner General, Godfrey Statia has since stated that it can only be seen as a case of collusion or gross negligence between officers at the bank and the perpetrators.
According to a letter to Bank of Guyana Governor, Dr. Gobind Ganga, Statia said the Authority obtained three forged copies of cheques that were cashed at a branch of GBTI and for which, withdrawals totaling $23.8M were made from the GRA’s Revenue Account. A fourth cheque was intercepted. Statia said a perusal of the cheques revealed several discrepancies which indicate that officers of GBTI failed to exercise due care and diligence by allowing the said cheques to be cashed.
Statia said GRA does not issue refund cheques with electronic signatures and any such development would have necessitated notifications to the Bank of Guyana and all Commercial Banks. Statia has also said that the bank has rules and operating procedures in place to minimize or prevent occurrences such as this, hence the bank’s failure to follow these rules could be interpreted as negligence or collusion with the perpetrators. He also said the liability of the said fraud is that of the bank.
