Dear Editor,

Quite recently, the judge in the Trelawny Circuit Court threw out some 53 lottery scamming-related cases, some of which were dragging out in the courts for up to seven years due to outstanding cybercrime reports from the Jamaica Constabulary Force’s Communication Forensics and Cybercrime Division.

This is unacceptable, to say the least, and a national disgrace of monumental proportions. It needs to be immediately addressed by Commissioner of Police Major General Antony Anderson.

I have noticed that over the past five years the lottery scamming crimes have been getting out of control and only a small amount of scammers are being arrested and charged for their crimes. There is the need for the Lottery Scamming Police Task Force to be totally revamped and new detectives assigned to this elite police unit.

Minister of Justice Delroy Chuck must proceed to increase the monetary fines and terms of imprisonment for all convicted scammers. The current convicted fines for lottery scammers are way too small and partly contributes to the huge numbers of those who are deeply involved in scamming.

It is prime time for Commissioner Anderson to implement the necessary police strategies to go all out after those dangerous lottery scammers who are damaging the reputation of Jamaica and the banking and financial sectors.

The ability of Jamaicans to shop online, carry out remittance transactions and wire transfers could be severely hampered if the country does not comply with the global anti-money laundering and countering of the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime and bring its rules up to international standards by October this year.

Three outstanding matters remain to be completed by October 2023; namely, operationalising risk-based supervision of beneficial ownership by the Companies Act, of lawyers by the General Legal Council complying, and of trust and corporate service providers by the Financial Services Commission.

Once these issues are completed by the Finance Ministry, Jamaica would then be able to apply for an on-site examination, whereby the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) will come to Jamaica and verify for themselves these actions had been taken and successfully implemented here in Jamaica.

Finance Minister Dr Nigel Clarke has to ensure that these remaining issues are speedily dealt with and I do hope that the issues are implemented by August 31, 2023.

Frank L R Manborde

Former four-term parish councillor

Local government researcher

franklrmanborde@mail.com