Couple from Latvia hires top
Dutch lawyer in appeal case
PHILIPSBURG--They did not say much themselves during the hearing of their appeal case by the Joint Court of the Netherlands and Aruba in the Courthouse Thursday morning, but Latvians Serge and Galina Slipachenko had hired one of the Netherlands’ top lawyers for their defence.
In November 2007, the Court of First Instance had sentenced the 51-year-old man and his 48-year-old wife to 59 months for forgery, money laundering and the possession of firearms.
However, the couple insisted that they were innocent and honest entrepreneurs, and had launched an appeal with the Joint Court, hiring the services of well-known Dutch attorney-at-law Bram Moszkowicz to assist their attorney Richard Gibson Jr. in their defence.
Moszkowicz is a high-profile attorney, who has represented many well known clients, such as Surinamese army leader Desi Bouterse, Dutch real estate tycoon Willem Endstra, and top crime boss Willem Holleeder.
The Joint Court did not allow Moszkowicz to plead as he was not formally admitted to the Bar in the Netherlands Antilles, but he was allowed to prompt his brother counsel, and was also given the opportunity to ask some additional questions to the leading detective in the investigations, who was called by the defence to testify.
Attorney General Leomar Angela did not change the Prosecution’s position in this case, and considered it proven that the Latvians had made use of false immigration documents and passports, had committed forgery of bank documents, and money laundering, and had been in the possession of several firearms.
All these crimes were allegedly committed between November 2001 and April 2006.
Angela calculated that the couple had garnered US $6.6 million by their criminal activities, and asked the Court to sentence them to seven years. This was six months lower than the demand presented to the Court of First Instance, but Angela said this was in compensation for the six weeks which Serge Slipachenko had spent in police detention.
The Attorney General further requested the confiscation of $4.4 million, and the confiscation of firearms, ammunition, false passports and driver’s licenses, and of a computer.
At an earlier date, the Prosecutor’s Office had already seized the couple’s house, a boat and several cars. The Attorney General asked to Court for permission to auction off the boat and a Hummer. The other worldly possessions will be dealt with in a separate procedure.
The Slipachenkos came to St. Maarten in November 2001, after they were convicted of fraud in Canada.
The Court of First Instance had considered both guilty of large-scale forgery and of the use of false documents. “They made millions with the production, sale and supply of false bank documents,” judge Rick Smid had stated in his written judgement.
The suspects appealed to their right to remain silent, and did not want to answer any questions during Thursday’s hearing before the three judges of the Appellate Court.
Their lawyers aimed their arrows at the start of the criminal investigation in January 2007, initiated after the RBTT Bank had informed the police of a possible case of identity fraud.
A bank manager reportedly had found out that Slipachenko had identified himself under one name to carry out bank transactions, and had used a different name to open a new account.
According to the defence the investigations into their clients’ alleged fraudulent acts had been illegitimate, seeing that at that time there had not been a reasonable “presumption of guilt,” which is legally required to start such investigations.
In their eyes, there only had been suspicion of identity fraud, and not of money laundering and other crimes. Therefore, Gibson stated that the Prosecution’s case against his clients should be declared inadmissible. He said his clients should be acquitted because all evidence gathered against them should be considered “fruits of a poisonous tree.”
The Joint Court will be presenting its decision in this case on July 3.
