SSL case adjourned until December
Published:Friday | June 16, 2023 | 1:15 AMTanesha Mundle/Staff Reporter - -
Jean-Ann Panton, the lone accused in the multibillion-dollar fraud investigation at Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL), was yesterday further remanded when the case was adjourned until December 6.
The former SSL client relationship manager is facing a 22-count indictment charging her with forgery, larceny as a servant, and engaging in a transaction involving criminal property.
Yesterday when the matter was called up, the Home Circuit Court was informed that the case file was still incomplete. The outstanding documents listed are the Communication Forensics and Cybercrime Division (CFCD) report and a cyber expert report from the Financial Investigative Division.
Justice Vinette Graham-Allen was informed that the delay was the result of the volume of information, spanning over a decade, that is being analysed.
In the meantime, the court was informed that five statements pertaining to the chain of custody of various items have not been disclosed to the defence.
Consequently, the judge adjourned the matter to facilitate the disclosure and to allow the defence to take written instructions from the defendant.
The judge also indicated that a date for a plea and case management hearing would be fixed on the next court date once full disclosure had been made.
Meanwhile, Justice Graham-Allen reminded the prosecution of the new standing order being practised in the courts in which victims and witnesses are to be kept abreast of the progress of the case after each hearing.
Panton, who appeared via Zoom, was remanded.
According to a signed statement made to SSL dated January 7, 2023, Panton admitted that she “used various mechanisms to take money from clients” and that she “created false statements to provide to the clients reflecting what they should have in their accounts and not the sum they actually had in their accounts”. She added that she took the money “over the course of several years”.
The statement, which was part of an internal SSL investigation, named 39 clients whose accounts had a total value of over $700 million.
Panton said she took approximately 20 per cent of that sum in addition to an additional $109 million.
An account in the name of Welljen Limited, a holding company owned by sports great Usain Bolt, was not mentioned on the list, and SSL said in a subsequent statement that it was unaware that the portfolio had been affected.
The 36-year-old retired 100m world record holder opened an account at SSL in the name of his holding company, Welljen, in 2012.
The account’s value plummeted from J$2 billion (US$12.7 million) in October 2022 to J$1.8 million, or US$12,000, in January when the fraud was uncovered.
Bolt has not recovered any money, his legal team has said.
Panton, however, in her response to a lawsuit brought against her by one of the complainants, claimed that she “confessed” because of an alleged “offer” from her former boss and the company’s founder, Hugh Croskery.
But Croskery’s attorney, King’s Counsel Peter Champagnie, was not prepared to comment on Panton’s claim when he was asked by The Gleaner late last month. “I would not want to venture into a discourse concerning what it is that Panton is alleged to have said. Her matter is before the court, and it is best dealt with in the court.”