The former Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) board member charged with accepting more than $600,000 in bribes from a foreign company over a decade ago to help it land BEC contracts will have his matter heard in the Supreme Court.
Freddie Ramsey appeared before Magistrate Guillemina Archer yesterday. Attorney Cordell Frazer, who appeared on behalf of the Office of the Attorney General, said that considering the length of time between the alleged crime and the date Ramsey was charged, the matter would have to proceed in the Supreme Court.
Frazer cited section 213 of the Criminal Procedure Code which deals with the "limitation of time for proceedings for summary offenses".
Magistrate Archer said, "That's trite. How is it that you knew that yet you put the matter to election?
"What does the law say?"
According to section 213, "Except where a longer time is specially allowed by law, no offense which is triable summarily shall be triable by a magistrate's court unless the charge or complaint relating to it is laid within six months from the time when the matter of such complaint or charge arose."
Archer told Ramsey, "I am now advised by the Office of the Attorney General that they do now wish to proceed by that course.
"They are now seeking to move out of the Magistrate's Court and have it proceed on its merits in the Supreme Court. The Office of the Attorney General will prepare the necessary documents and present them to this court for the matter to be expedited to the Supreme Court. Do you understand?"
Ramsey, who appeared calm, said yes.
The matter was then adjourned to December 15 when Ramsey will be served a voluntary bill of indictment. Attorney Roger Minnis and Miles Parker appeared on behalf of Ramsey. On October 2, Ramsey, 78, was arraigned on four counts of conspiracy to commit bribery and 14 counts of bribery.
Prosecutors allege that Ramsey accepted a total of $651,788.90 between 1999 and February 2003. It is alleged that Ramsey acted with others, but he was the only one who was charged. Ramsey, a former Free National Movement candidate for Fox Hill, pleaded not guilty to all of the charges.
The payments allegedly range from $13,548.25 to $99,650. He allegedly collected the payments on 14 different occasions. In exchange, Ramsey allegedly used his influence to get Alstom Power Espana S.A. (formerly ABB Generacian S.A.) contracts for the second and third phase of BEC's New Providence Expansion Project. He is on $40,000 bail with two sureties.
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