PHILIPSBURG--The Civil Court in Curaçao has declared the Joint Court’s claims against former manager of the Joint Court’s branch in St. Maarten M.J.-C. inadmissible and awarded court fees to her, the Joint Court said in a statement on Thursday.
The highest Civil Servants Court decided on January 21, 2020, that the punitive dismissal of the former branch manager of the Court of First Instance of St. Maarten had been legal. In this judgment it was stipulated that J.-C. must repay US $1,015,295 in third-party funds to the Joint Court of Justice.
At the same time, the Joint Court also initiated legal proceedings against its former branch manager before the Court of First Instance in Curaçao with the purpose to collect $1,148,160 in damages, and subsequently, to seize properties.
However, the Civil Court in Curaçao has declared the Joint Court’s claims inadmissible and awarded court fees to the manager.
The Civil Court arrived at this conclusion because the Civil Servants Court has exclusive jurisdiction to determine the damages and the Civil Court does not. The former Court manager’s counterclaim for lifting the attachment on an apartment building of which she is the co-owner has been dismissed by the Civil Court.
The Joint Court is now considering an appeal against the Civil Court’s decision. The decision of the Civil Court does not affect the judgment of the highest Civil Servants Court that J.-C. had committed a wrongful act, as well as her obligation to repay $1,015,295.
Apart from these civil proceedings, J.-C. is also subject in a criminal investigation dubbed “Triggerfish”, which is still ongoing. In this case, J.-C. is charged with embezzlement of approximately $1.2 million from the Court’s bank accounts between January 2014 and December 2017, and with the embezzlement of NAf. 153,697 from the Constitutional Court’s bank account. She is also charged with money-laundering allegedly committed between January 2014 and September 7, 2018.
The fourth charge in J.-C.’s indictment mentions the alleged forgery of a Windward Islands Bank (WIB) money-transfer form between September 1 and September 30, 2016. The final charge includes the allegation that the former civil servant defrauded the Ministry of Justice of the amount of NAf. 50,000 in June 2018.
Her, husband R.A.J., who is a pensioner and former station manager of now defunct airline Dutch Antilles Express (DAE), is charged with laundering amounts of $171,160 and NAf. 50,591 between January 2014 and December 2017, a crime he allegedly committed together with his wife.
During a court hearing in their criminal cases in July 2019, the couple vehemently denied they had been involved in any wrongdoings pertaining to the embezzlement of money from the St. Maarten Court’s bank accounts. The presiding judge considered additional investigations and the hearing of witnesses pertaining to the alleged crimes necessary.
It is not yet known when the hearings in the criminal case will be resumed.
