Telecom scam suspect fails in bid for detail on charges

Telecom scam suspect fails in bid for detail on charges

THE High Court has dismissed a bid by former senior Telecom Namibia manager James Camm to get the High Court to order the State to provide him with more details on the corruption, fraud and theft charges that he and two co-accused are set to face at a trial in the High Court.

Camm’s lawyer, Andreas Vaatz, asked Acting Judge Collins Parker during a pre-trial court appearance by Camm a month ago to order the State to provide Camm with answers to an extensive request for further particulars on the charges against him and his co-accused. Acting Judge Parker turned down that request last week.Camm and Windhoek businessmen Heinz Dresselhaus and Etienne Weakley are set to face a total of 30 charges, set out in an indictment covering 102 typewritten pages, at their trial.The charges are made up of 11 main counts of corruption, 13 main counts of fraud, and six main counts of theft, with various alternative charges also set out under each of the main counts.All the charges flow from allegations that Dresselhaus, Weakley, Camm and a former colleague of Camm at Telecom Namibia, Lutchmanan Ivan Ganes, were joint partners in a scam under the cover of an agreement that Telecom Namibia had to sell scrap copper to a scrap dealership of Dresselhaus and Weakley, Dresselhaus Scrap.The State alleges that during the existence of this agreement, and specifically from October 1998 to February 2001, Dresselhaus and Weakley on some occasions removed scrap copper belonging to Telecom Namibia without paying the company for the material.It also alleges that on other occasions they paid Telecom Namibia at a lower rate than had been agreed, and that during this process kickbacks totalling some N$1,3 million were shared between Ganes, Camm, Dresselhaus and Weakley.Camm still did not know exactly what the State was alleging he had done, Vaatz told the court when he asked for the order compelling the prosecution to provide Camm with more particulars on the charges against him.Vaatz was asking the court to order the State to provide him with “a full and comprehensive reply” to “a multitude of questions – totalling 428” and running into 52 pages, in Acting Judge Parker’s words, that he had sent to the prosecution.The indictment, the Police docket on the case – itself running into more than 2 500 pages of documents – and answers that Deputy Prosecutor-General Danie Small had already provided to him, are however sufficient to give Camm a proper idea of what the allegations are that he will have to answer to, the Acting Judge found.He remarked: “I do not have a grain of doubt in my mind that what (Camm) requests are not particulars required to enable him to know the case that is proposed to be made against him and thus enable him to prepare his defence.Most of the questions he has posed are the type of questions that he is entitled to put to any witness who is called to give evidence in support of the charges levelled against him.”He was satisfied that the totality of the information and particulars that the prosecution has already delivered to Camm met the requirements of fairness and justice to both Camm and the prosecution, Acting Judge Parker stated.Dresselhaus, Weakley and Camm will now have to make another pre-trial appearance in the High Court on July 14.Acting Judge Parker turned down that request last week.Camm and Windhoek businessmen Heinz Dresselhaus and Etienne Weakley are set to face a total of 30 charges, set out in an indictment covering 102 typewritten pages, at their trial.The charges are made up of 11 main counts of corruption, 13 main counts of fraud, and six main counts of theft, with various alternative charges also set out under each of the main counts.All the charges flow from allegations that Dresselhaus, Weakley, Camm and a former colleague of Camm at Telecom Namibia, Lutchmanan Ivan Ganes, were joint partners in a scam under the cover of an agreement that Telecom Namibia had to sell scrap copper to a scrap dealership of Dresselhaus and Weakley, Dresselhaus Scrap.The State alleges that during the existence of this agreement, and specifically from October 1998 to February 2001, Dresselhaus and Weakley on some occasions removed scrap copper belonging to Telecom Namibia without paying the company for the material.It also alleges that on other occasions they paid Telecom Namibia at a lower rate than had been agreed, and that during this process kickbacks totalling some N$1,3 million were shared between Ganes, Camm, Dresselhaus and Weakley.Camm still did not know exactly what the State was alleging he had done, Vaatz told the court when he asked for the order compelling the prosecution to provide Camm with more particulars on the charges against him.Vaatz was asking the court to order the State to provide him with “a full and comprehensive reply” to “a multitude of questions – totalling 428” and running into 52 pages, in Acting Judge Parker’s words, that he had sent to the prosecution.The indictment, the Police docket on the case – itself running into more than 2 500 pages of documents – and answers that Deputy Prosecutor-General Danie Small had already provided to him, are however sufficient to give Camm a proper idea of what the allegations are that he will have to answer to, the Acting Judge found.He remarked: “I do not have a grain of doubt in my mind that what (Camm) requests are not particulars required to enable him to know the case that is proposed to be made against him and thus enable him to prepare his defence.Most of the questions he has posed are the type of questions that he is entitled to put to any witness who is called to give evidence in support of the charges levelled against him.”He was satisfied that the totality of the information and particulars that the prosecution has already delivered to Camm met the requirements of fairness and justice to both Camm and the prosecution, Acting Judge Parker stated.Dresselhaus, Weakley and Camm will now have to make another pre-trial appearance in the High Court on July 14.

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