The Presidential Investigative Team (retired) has noted with regret a vilification made by Judge Yamie Q. Gbessay of the First Judicial Circuit Court Assizes “C” in his final judgement of the case, Republic of Liberia vs Milton A. Weeks et. Al, that “it is the PIT report that misled the prosecution into charging the defendants for the printing of L$13 billion plus instead of L$10 billion as contracted, thereby reaching an erroneous conclusion that 2.645 billion was missing”.
The PIT (retired) reject this slander based on the following points: The PIT (retired) investigation mandate ended January 2019, after an exhaustive review of documents provided by individuals and corporations (including Crane Currency and CBL), along with recorded interviews. A full report was submitted to the Ministry of Justice in late February 2019. The report catalogued a list of recommendations. Financial investigations are based on documents, as such the documents reviewed at the time from both Crane and the CBL alluded to the over printing of $2.645 billion Liberian dollars; it is the understanding of the PIT (retired) that the Ministry of Justice received additional information from Crane Currency and other corporations involved, after the PIT was retired and therefore not privy to said documents. Crane Currency sent a representative to Liberia who met with MoJ and other officials in November 2019, and apologized for their late respond to our report. After careful review by The Ministry of Justice, charges were dropped thus relieving Crane Currency of any liability. Kindly note that the PIT was retired on March 1st 2019 and was not reconvene. “In the view of the PIT (retired), Judge Gbessay statement is disingenuous, erroneous and hence his conclusion completely false.”
