More arrests pending in alleged $200m INSPORTS racket

The Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency (MOCA) has indicated that it is in possession of several warrants to arrest other suspects in a suspected $200-million fraud scheme at the Institute of Sports (INSPORTS), which culminated in three people being charged on Wednesday.

Well-known party promoter Andrew Wright was among three people arrested and charged on Wednesday in connection with the alleged $222-million racket that investigators believe was committed at INSPORTS between 2011 and 2017.

MOCA said Wright, promoter of popular parties Chug It and French Connection; Rudolph Barnes; and Oneil Hope are alleged to have been part of a team of former INSPORTS employees who wrote, signed, and encashed fraudulent cheques for payees who were neither employees nor contracted workers of the entity.

The Gleaner, in August 2020, reported that Wright, who had his bank accounts frozen for almost two months amid a probe by the Financial Investigations Division, had filed a more than $220-million lawsuit against the Government.

Wright, Barnes and Hope have been charged with various offences, including conspiracy to defraud; acquisition, use, and possession of criminal property; engaging in transactions involving criminal property; and larceny as a servant.

MOCA said the suspected fraud and other irregularities were detected by INSPORTS in 2017 during an examination of its financial records. The matter was then reported to the agency, triggering an investigation.

In a statement on Wednesday, Minister of Sports Olivia Grange said that she noted the arrests and charges brought by MOCA as part of a long-running investigation into “serious irregularities that took place several years ago” at INSPORTS.

“I await the outcome of the process. You will recall that on my return to government in 2016, I received a special audit of the Institute of Sports by the auditor general, which showed an organisation that was continually breaking the law, badly managed, and in need of urgent transformation.

“I understand that the arrests and charges are linked to that period when INSPORTS was considered a rogue agency. Under our watch, the Institute of Sports is a completely transformed agency with improved internal controls, is well-run and delivering its mandate of developing sports at the grass roots,” said Grange.

MOCA Director of Communications Major Basil Jarrett said that more arrests are on the horizon as the agency currently has warrants out for several other individuals.

From as far back as November 2011, Auditor General Pamela Monroe Ellis reported a litany of red flags at the government agency, including the fact that INSPORTS had not prepared annual reports since its inception in 1978, a requirement under the Public Bodies Management and Accountability Act.

INSPORTS also continued to pay salary and travelling allowances, totalling $11.73 million at that time, to two officers who had not reported to work for periods up to seven years.

Financial statements

It was also found that INSPORTS failed to present audited financial statements for 19 years and incurred unauthorised payment of $24.6 million for 13 unapproved posts.

In a 2017 special-audit report, Monroe Ellis noted that the various corporate governance deficiencies, improper payment of emoluments, and procurement breaches that were detailed in the 2011 report persisted.

At that time, INSPORTS had still never submitted annual reports, and its last audited financial statement prepared was for the financial year 1991-1992.

Monroe Ellis had said that by its non-submission of the statutory annual report and audited financial statements for 23 years, the government entity deprived the parent ministry and the Parliament of their oversight function regarding the financial and operational performance.

“INSPORTS’s failure not only breached the law, but is worrying from a fiduciary responsibility position given that its accounting records showed that for the six-year period 2005-06 to 2010-11, total revenues amounted to $1.4 billion while expenditure totalled $1.5 billion,” she said then.

Grange, former Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller, and Natalie Neita Garvey served as sports ministers between 2005 and 2017.

kimone.francis@gleanerjm.com