Loor gets reduction
of prison sentence
PHILIPSBURG--Former Police Commissioner Marcel Loor is “not dissatisfied” with the outcome of the appeal case launched against the ruling of the Court of First Instance in which he was sentenced to four years in prison, his lawyer Richard Gibson Jr. said in a reaction.
The Joint Court of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba annulled that ruling Thursday and sentenced Loor to 24 months, six of which were suspended, with three years probation and payment of a NAf. 15,000 fine.
Gibson said he had discussed the ruling with his client only briefly, but said in a first reaction that that they were pleased that Loor’s jail term had been slashed considerably. He said it was not clear yet whether his client would launch an appeal at the High Court in The Hague.
The three judges of the Joint Court found the former Head of the Immigration and Naturalisation Department guilty of forgery of Immigration re-entry forms between January 2002 and June 2007, allowing illegal immigrants entrance to the island.
In doing so, Loor had forced Immigration officers to cooperate in illegal operations and had brought corruption into the Police Force, the Joint Court stated in its ruling.
The Appeal Court acquitted Loor of the charge that he had accepted bribes to issue entry permits, for lack of proof.
The Court further found Loor guilty of defrauding the Coast Guard of more than NAf. 230,000 in rent allowance; income tax evasion; the forgery of requests to lower wage taxes; and of money laundering by depositing sums derived from fraud, tax crimes and other yet-to-be-uncovered sources in an offshore company in Nevis.
The Court of First Instance had convicted Loor on forgery, bribery, fraud, tax evasion and money laundering charges, and had sentenced him to four years and a NAf. 600,000 fine, while NAf. 191,254.92 had to be paid back to the Coast Guard.
The Joint Court rejected Loor’s appeal to have the Prosecutor’s Office case against him declared inadmissible. His lawyer had stated that Loor had not had a fair trial because the Prosecutor’s Office had violated the presumption of “innocence until proven guilty” in the media.
Gibson Jr. further mentioned tapping the phone of Loor’s girlfriend, the use of disproportionate pressure during questioning, illegitimate investigations in Suriname, and the fact that the prosecution of fiscal crimes had not been left in the hands of the Tax Inspector as violations of his client’s rights.
More in line with regular civil procedures, the Joint Court imposed a lower fine for the tax crimes, also taking into account that the Tax Office would still claim the arrears.
