A former National Housing Development Trust board member told the court they were caught off guard and left scrambling to separate fact from fiction when media reports surfaced of a potential conflict of interest with the then board chairman.
“We called an emergency meeting because there were just so many things being said and we were just trying to figure out what had really happened,” said Dominic Williams, while giving evidence on Friday, 5 April on behalf of the prosecution.
Williams began testifying two weeks into the ongoing trial of former chairman Geoffry Ebanks, who faces breach of trust and conflict of interest charges. He denies any wrongdoing.
According to Williams, he and several then board members met at an offsite location for a meeting where no minutes were taken, during which they asked the chairman to address the rumours.
“After that meeting, it was decided not to do anything, because investigations were still ongoing, and there was a lot of confusion about what had really happened,” he said.
The rumours and allegations arose from the distribution of 11 acres of vegetable matter accumulated while clearing the North Side low-income housing development site.
Williams recalled Ebanks had confirmed that he had been the recipient of several truckloads of fill material, adding some credence to the allegations.
Waited on investigation
“We kinda just decided that there was work to be done and we needed to do what we could to get people their homes and that we would cross the bridge when we get to it, based on the outcome of the investigation,” said Williams.
According to Williams, there was a sense of urgency for the housing trust to part ways with the vegetation, after a fleeting tropical storm that passed near the Cayman Islands left the material strewn as debris.
As revealed during the trial, the plan was for the material to be trucked to Beacon Farms to be donated and eventually turned into compost at $60 per truckload – cheaper than the $100 per truckload to have the material delivered to the landfill.
In total, 303 truckloads were removed from the site, destined for Beacon Farms which, after receiving the first 171 truckloads, stated they were full and needed time to process what they had.
Of those 303 truckloads, Ebanks received 60, which was deposited on land belonging to himself and his father – which he accepted had occurred but said he brought it to the attention of housing trust general manager Julio Ramos.
Earlier in the trial, Ramos told the jury of six women and one man that Ebanks approached him expressing an interest in the material but added that he informed Ebanks he needed the board’s approval to redirect the material to property in which he had a personal interest.
According to Williams, when news of the alleged wrongdoing surfaced, the board was still pretty new, with “green members”, who had never received formal training about matters that could amount to a breach of trust or conflict of interest.
“We had never actually had any training about things like conflict of interest before any of this, we were all still pretty green members,” said Williams. “Since this incident, we all had to go through it.”
The trial resumes on Monday when Williams will be cross-examined. Ebanks remains on bail.
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