ESTABLISHED 1965 www.caymancompass.com – 50 CENTS – MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 LEGAL DEPARTMENT BLAMES OPERATION TEMPURA FOR $2.7M CONSULTANT BILL BRENT FULLER bfuller@pinnaclemedialtd.com The litigious fallout from the ill-fated Oper- ation Tempura corruption probe, which ended nearly a decade ago, was blamed last week for running up a $2.7 million consultant’s bill within government’s Portfolio of Legal Affairs. The additional expenses were noted in Auditor General Sue Winspear’s report that tallied up $35 million in central government consultant’s bills between 2012 and 2017. The total legal-related consultant expenses were about $8.2 million across government, but the largest single expense – about 33 percent, or $2.7 million – was incurred by the Portfolio of Legal Affairs. The Legislative Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee Chairman, North Side MLA Ezzard Miller, asked portfolio officials Thursday why so much money had been spent on outside law- yers during the period. “Why is that necessary when we have a fully staffed legal department?” Mr. Miller asked. “There was a significant volume of what I would say was unprecedented litigation arising out of the [Operation] Tempura matter,” said Acting Solicitor General Reshma Sharma. “The demands on the department at that time as a result of those cases was quite significant.” Although the original Operation Tempura in- vestigation was all but complete by the end of 2009, Ms. Sharma noted that “spin off” litiga- tion resulting from the probe went on for years afterwards and, therefore, showed up in the au- ditor general’s report covering consultant ex- penses between 2012 and 2017. She said the mat- ters involved were complex and required specific counsel with expertise to carry them forward. One of those lawyers, a former assistant solicitor general who had handled most of the Tempura- related claims, left to join a private law firm in 2013 and was kept on as a consultant by government to finish up pending cases, she said. Ms. Sharma identified several of the court cases during Public Accounts Committee proceedings where outside counsel had to be retained. Those included former Police Commissioner Stuart Cayman Carnival Batabano organizer Donna Myrie-Stephen takes a break from Saturday’s parade to pose with Cayman Islands Governor Anwar Choudhury. - PHOTO: TANEOS RAMSAY PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 8 » Batabano swaggers down Seven Mile Beach MARK MUCKENFUSS mmuckenfuss@pinnaclemedialtd.com Despite a forecast threatening rain, the sun shone on Batabano on Saturday. Scores of feathered and sequined women – and a few men – some wearing the barest of bikinis, strolled and danced their way from Public Beach to George Town along a route strung with enthusi- astic supporters. Flatbed trucks crowded with revelers, festooned with promotional signs and filled with speakers, provided a thumping, blaring soundtrack for the annual event that has been one of Grand Cayman’s main festivals since 1983. The slow-moving procession began about 1 p.m. and finally crawled into George Town just before 7. Gov. Anwar Choudhury and his wife Momina immersed themselves in the fes- tivities, posing for pictures with cele- brants and enjoying the atmosphere. “We’ve been following it all day,” Mr. Choudhury said, as the couple sat near the courthouse. “We’re loving it. People are so happy and friendly.” He said he is hoping an agreement can be reached to reunite those that split from the event to create a second carnival event, CayMas, which will hold its parade May 19. “I’m hoping we can get together and have one big party,” he said. “We’re always stronger as one.” CUSTOMS OFFICER NOT GUILTY OF FIREARM OFFENSES Suspended customs officer Claude An- thony Terry was found not guilty of unli- censed firearm offenses dating from August 2016. A jury and judge cleared the Cayman Brac–based officer of charges involving a revolver, ammunition and pepper spray. For more on this story, see page 3. PLEASE TURN TO PAGE 12 »2 LOCAL&REGIONAL MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS I am not going to Honduras,” she said, noting that many of the asylum-seeking migrants in a caravan that recently reached the U.S.-Mexico border are from Honduras. “If they are coming, why am I going over there?” “There is no way I will go back,” Connor said. Around 437,000 immi- grants hailing from 10 coun- tries have had temporary protected status, a designa- tion created in 1990 to allow people from countries af- fected by natural disasters like earthquakes or man- made disasters like war to have a short-term safe haven. Only a few thousand still have that status. Those with it have gener- ally been able to work and with permission, travel out- side the U.S. and return. Countries are added to the list as circumstances war- rant, with renewals coming usually around every 18 months. While some coun- tries have been taken off the list, others have stayed on it for extended periods, which critics say turns the program into default amnesty. Under Trump, the Depart- ment of Homeland Security has terminated the program for Sudan, Nicaragua, Nepal, Haiti, and notably El Sal- vador, which accounted for more holders of the special status than any other nation. They have been given deadlines to leave or gain legal status if possible, starting in November for Sudan and throughout 2019 for the other countries. Several groups are suing to stay in the U.S. The protections have been extended for 6,900 Syrians who already have them, but the administration has said it will not take on new ap- plicants. Decisions are up- coming for South Sudan, So- malia and Yemen, which cover fewer than 1,700 people. Daniel Sharp, legal director at the Central American Re- source Center in Los Angeles, said he does not believe most immigrants with the status will leave after setting down roots with U.S.-born children, jobs and homes. “People don’t want to go back to being undocumented, but I don’t think you are going to see a ton of people returning to their countries of origin,” he said. El Salvador actually had the protections twice, the first time in the early 1990s until December 1994. It’s es- timated that about 150,000 people were covered then. Cecilia Menjivar, a Univer- sity of Kansas sociology pro- fessor, said that while exact numbers are unknown, it’s clear many stayed in the U.S. when the program ended. Some got permanent resi- dency through family spon- sorship, but immigration law has changed since then that “there are fewer avenues for legalization,” she said. • Matinees Daily (matinee price before 6pm) • Seniors $8.00, Mon-Fri Before 6pm • Additional charges apply per 3D/VIP tickets Cayman Cinema@cbcinema6cbcinema6 SATURDAY NIGHT: For your viewing pleasure, minors under the age of 18 will not be admitted to any film starting after 6pm, unless accompanied by their parent. - MONDAY - 640-FILM (640-3456) I FEEL PRETTY (PG13) 1:30 I 4:05 I 6:45 I 10:05 AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR 3D (PG13) 12:15 2D VIP I 12:20 I 3:30 2D VIP 3:35 2D I 6:45 2D VIP I 6:50 2D 9:20 I 9:55 2D VIP OVERBOARD (PG13) 1:00 I 3:45 I 7:00 I 9:40 A QUIET PLACE (PG13) 12:30 I 2:45 I 5:00 I 7:30 I 10:00 RAMPAGE (PG13) 1:30 I 4:15 I 9:50 I CAN ONLY IMAGINE (PG) 7:10 Sunday road closure JURY NOTICE FOR MONDAY MAY 7 All current Grand Court Jurors in the April 4 to July 3 session are advised that the report date of Monday, May 7 has been changed. The new report date is Monday, May 14, at 9:45 a.m. Please call the Jury In- formation line at 244- 3899 for the most up-to- date information or email jury@judicial.ky. HospiceCare hosts annual Big Bash gala event Cayman HospiceCare held its 18th annual Big Bash gala event Friday night at Ristorante Pappagallo in West Bay. One hundred percent of ticket proceeds go to the nonprofit organization, which provides end-of-life care to people in the Cayman Islands. Pictured are Sophia Harris, Nancy Binz, Dr. Virginia Hobday, Dianne Siebens, Suladda May and Maggie Jackson. – PHOTO: LEN JACKSON A section of North Sound Road was closed for several hours on Sunday so work crews could repave it. The closure was on the southbound side of the road extending from the Butterfield Roundabout to Portland Round. - PHOTO: MARK MUCKENFUSS US ends immigration protections for thousands of Hondurans NEW YORK (AP) – The Trump administration said Friday that it is ending special im- migration protections for about 57,000 Hondurans, adding them to hundreds of thousands of immigrants from other countries bat- tered by violence and nat- ural disasters who are losing permission to be in the United States. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s widely anticipated decision not to renew temporary protected status for Hondurans means an estimated 428,000 people from several countries face rolling deadlines begin- ning late this year to leave or obtain legal residency in other ways. Hondurans will have until Jan. 5, 2020, Home- land Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said. President Donald Trump – who wants to curtail legal immigration and has been cracking down broadly on il- legal immigration – and his supporters note that the pro- tections were never meant to be permanent. Immigrant advocates de- cried the move and contend that ending the status will drive people underground who have been establishing roots in the U.S. for years or decades, including having American-born children. For Hondurans, the pro- gram known as TPS has been in place since 1999 after Hur- ricane Mitch devastated in the Central American nation the year before. The administration says conditions in Honduras have improved, while advocates argue that it still has not fully recovered from the hur- ricane and is now plagued by rampant violence. Trump, his opponents argue, is effectively adding tens, if not hundreds, of thou- sands of people to the ranks of those in the U.S. without legal status. Marta Connor, a 50-year- old union organizer in Southern California who has lived in the U.S. for decades and has three American-born children, said before the an- nouncement that she was not leaving, regardless of the ad- ministration’s policies. “One thing I can tell you is The Vice-Chancellor of Honduras, Isaias Barahona, speaks during a press conference in Tegucigalpa Friday. The Honduran government is expressing regret over a U.S. move to end temporary protected status for tens of thousands Hondurans residing in the United States. - PHOTO: AP3 LOCAL NEWS CAYMAN COMPASS • MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 Customs officer not guilty of firearm offenses Judge directs ‘not guilty’ verdict for possession of prohibited pepper spray CAROL WINKER cwinker@pinnaclemedialtd.com Suspended customs of- ficer Claude Anthony Terry was found not guilty on Friday of unlicensed firearm charges dating from August 2016. A jury of five women and two men deliberated less than half an hour be- fore returning their unani- mous verdicts. In summing up the case, Justice Michael Wood had told jurors that the ques- tion for them was – were they sure that on Aug. 23, 2016, Mr. Terry was know- ingly in control of the Smith & Wesson revolver and eight rounds of ammunition found that day in a box in- side the water tank behind his Cayman Brac apartment. The judge referred to ev- idence that anybody could have had access to the water tank whether they lived at the apartment complex or not. There was evidence that the cover to an opening in the tank did not have a lock. The judge discussed the box, which the jury had seen. It was a gray Pelican- brand container. Mr. Terry, when he gave his evidence, had demonstrated how to make the box air-tight and water-tight with a seal, pres- sure latches and a knob that had to be turned tightly. The judge pointed out that the box when found had not been made water-tight be- cause there were water spots on the contents, including the gun, bag of bullets and a can of pepper spray. There were no finger- prints on anything. Justice Wood referred to evidence that the defen- dant’s DNA was “all over the gun.” But Mr. Terry said he had touched the gun on various occasions when he was trying to make room in a cabinet in which con- fiscated items were kept at the Customs Enforcement Office at the District Ad- ministration Building. The DNA expert witness had told the court that DNA could last for years. Before his arrest, Mr. Terry had expressed con- cern about the safe storage of items seized. The judge described the security of stored items as “shambolic,” emphasizing that it was his word, not the defendant’s. Mr. Terry had described things as “lackadaisical.” Crown prosecutor Ken- neth Ferguson had called the police sergeant who was in charge of distrib- uting pepper spray to au- thorised users on the Brac. This officer said he had created a computer file in which he listed who had re- ceived which containers and when. However, when asked to check the file, he found it was corrupt and informa- tion could not be retrieved. He said he did remember is- suing pepper spray to Mr. Terry, but he could not put a date to it. Based on this evidence, the judge instructed the jury to return a verdict of not guilty to a charge of pos- sessing a prohibited weapon without authorization. Defense attorney Crister Brady addressed the ju- rors before the judge did. He pointed out that their job was not to decide who had put the box in the water tank; their job was to decide if Mr. Terry had put it there. If it was his, why did he not keep it in his house where it would be safe, Mr. Brady wondered. When he saw his landlord’s employee doing some work around the water tank, why did not he just go out and retrieve the box? When he saw the land- lord and police inspector there, why didn’t he just go out and get the box? He could have explained that he had kept it in the tank because he didn’t want his girlfriend to see it in the house, Mr. Brady suggested. The landlord said in his evidence that Mr. Terry had come out and asked if they had found his “box.” Mr. Terry said he had asked if they found his “case” – refer- ring to the case for his cell- phone, which he said had accidentally dropped into the tank the previous Sat- urday. A phone case was later found in the tank. The landlord was pretty sure about what he heard, but honest people make mis- takes, Mr. Brady said. He wondered why the po- lice inspector did not ask Mr. Terry about the box at the scene. Instead, she told him to go back into his apartment. Hours went by before other police officers came to arrest him. Crown witnesses had confirmed that there were people who did not like Mr. Terry, who had filed com- plaints against other civil servants. Would someone put this “kit” together in the hope that Mr. Terry would be removed from his job? Mr. Brady queried. One of the people who might not like the defendant had not even been interviewed by police, the attorney pointed out. He asked the jury to send Mr. Terry back to work. Defense attorney Crister Brady addressed the jurors before the judge did. He pointed out that their job was not to decide who had put the box in the water tank; their job was to decide if Mr. Terry had put it there. Tennis club pro charged with theft, forgery WITNESSES TO FATAL CRASH SOUGHT ROBBERY, BURGLARY ATTEMPTS FAIL MAN BEATEN AT WB PUBLIC BEACH The long-serving man- ager and head profes- sional at the Cayman Is- lands Tennis Club has been charged with a string of offenses, in- cluding theft and forgery, in connection with funds allegedly stolen from the club. Rob Seward was ini- tially arrested in January and put on police bail as investigations continued. He was formally charged Thursday with multiple counts of theft, forgery, obtaining prop- erty by deception, ut- tering a forged document, and converting, dis- guising or concealing pro- ceeds of criminal conduct. Mr. Seward, 46, is scheduled to appear in court Tuesday. Police are seeking help from witnesses to a fatal car crash on North Side Road at Ronald Forbes Play Field on April 29. John Miller III, 27, was killed when the Honda he was in hit a utility pole. Investigators are looking for information on a red vehicle, make and model unknown, that may have been overtaken by the Honda shortly before the crash. Police would not say whether they thought the two cars might be racing, or if the Honda, which was traveling at high speed, was simply trying to pass it. Anyone with informa- tion should contact the Traffic and Roads Po- licing Unit at 649-6254 or traffic investigator PC Devon O’Connor at Devon.O’Connor@rcips.ky Attempts to rob or burgle two Grand Cayman busi- nesses during the overnight period between Wednesday and Thursday last week both failed, according to the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service. Police said officers were called to an attempted rob- bery around 8:20 p.m. Wednesday at the Carib- bean Bakery in West Bay. Officers said two staff members had just closed the business when a man opened the door and entered the store, holding what wit- nesses said looked like a handgun and demanding money. The staff members refused, police said, and the suspect ran from the store. Nothing was taken and no one was in- jured police said. In a separate incident re- ported early Thursday, po- lice said a man was seen trying to get into Seven Mile Beach bar just before 2 a.m. Police arrested the sus- pect, a 20-year-old Bodden Town man, shortly after they responded to the crime scene. Royal Cayman Islands Po- lice are investigating after a man was beaten Wednesday evening by a group of four men at West Bay Public Beach. The assault was reported around 6:30 p.m. Police said the victim in the attack was approached by the group and threatened before he was set upon. “The victim fell to the ground during the attack and was also hit with sticks and a rock before the assailants fled the scene,” a police re- port indicated. The man, a Cayman Is- lands resident, was seri- ously hurt and hospitalized Wednesday night, police said. The islands’ most-trusted news source 4 – EDITORIAL – Opinion&Letters The Cayman Compass welcomes comments, opinions and viewpoints from readers. Letters to the editor can be emailed to editor@pinnaclemedialtd.com, submitted via www.caymancompass.com, sent by post or hand-delivered to the Compass office. Already burdensome health insurance costs are spiraling out of control – as many readers know from personal experience. Last week’s Public Accounts Com- mittee review of recent Cayman Islands Monetary Authority reports quantifies just how out of control it is. In the 2015/16 fiscal year alone, while health insur- ance premiums paid by private sector employees and employers soared, earnings for private sector health insurers nearly quadrupled – rising from $14 million in 2014 to $51.5 million by December 2015. As Bodden Town West MLA Chris Saunders noted during last Wednesday’s PAC meeting, CIMA’s annual reports document significant increases in earnings for the health insurance sector going back to at least 2011 – when the sector’s earnings totaled around $4 million – although none of those were nearly as significant as the change during 2014-15. Troublingly, more recent data about premiums and earnings were not presented to the committee. Why not? In all matters economic, 2015 is ancient history. Statistics that old are more appropriately rel- egated to the shredder when analysts do their spring cleaning. Certainly they are not reliable to understand current circumstances. And so we must ask: Do up-to-date figures exist? If they do, where are they? If they do not, why not? Health Insurance Superintendent Mervyn Conolly told the PAC the Health Insurance Commission finds premium increases “disconcerting.” “Disconcerting?” What does that mean? – “Unac- ceptable … troubling … bamboozling … surprising?” Mr. Conolly needs to be far more forthcoming about what is taking place in our health insurance markets under the regulatory eye of the commission he heads. After all, the government forces employers and their employees to purchase health insurance coverage. That mandate, of course, creates a huge captive body of consumers for a relatively few – nine – insurance providers. Therefore, it is incumbent that the regulator, well, regulates. It must ensure that the favored providers are acting reasonably, relative to both premiums and profits. Government must also ensure that enforce- ment is applied equitably and consistently and without any hint of favoritism. We are still dismayed that cases of “non-contributions” by some businesses to their employees’ healthcare plans have been in the courts for years – one is approaching a decade! All of this, of course, is in the context of the private sector. Government employees receive so-called “free” healthcare, meaning they make no contributions to offset the cost of their premiums. (This is doubly vexing to those in the private sector since they are paying not only their own ever-increasing premiums but also those of the “free riders” in the civil service.) The cost of healthcare, including insurance costs, has driven many families, companies and, yes, coun- tries over the edge into penury. The problem becomes infinitely more complex when governments start “mandating” coverage with little consideration of how their “mandates” will impact the budgets of families and the companies that employ them. Cayman, may we suggest, needs to do a comprehen- sive holistic examination of its healthcare delivery model. If we were in charge of such an exercise, our first call would be to perhaps the world’s leading champion (and practitioner) of delivering high-quality healthcare at drastically lower and realistic costs: Dr. Devi Shetty. Health insurance: A product divorced from market reality MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS Which country pillages its workers the most? Congratulations to Bel- gium. According to the new edition of Taxing Wages, av- erage Belgian workers have the dubious honor of sur- rendering the biggest chunk of their income to govern- ment. No wonder part of the country is interested in secession. We can also give (sin- cere, this time, rather than sarcastic) congratulations to New Zealand and Swit- zerland, which impose the lowest overall tax burden on the labor income of av- erage workers (with honor- able mention to Chile and Mexico for low tax burdens in developing countries). The United States, I’m happy to report, is in the bottom half, which means the government confiscates a below-average amount of money from workers. Other nations with onerous burdens include Germany, Italy, and France Regarding the Belgian tax burden, the government understands this is bad news for Belgium’s economy, so there are periodic dis- cussions about reducing the tax burden on labor in- come. Unfortunately, the po- tential “reforms” tend to be senseless tax swaps which would involve higher taxes on consumption or higher taxes on capital. In the former case, the government would take more money as income is spent, so workers would not benefit. And in the latter case, there would be less investment, so workers wouldn’t benefit since their pre-tax wages would suffer. The bottom line is that it’s impossible to have a good tax system with a bloated government. By the way, the pre- vious ranking looked at the tax burden on the av- erage worker with no chil- dren. Some countries have preferential tax policies for households with kids. Even taking that into consider- ation, Belgium still wins the Booby Prize for highest tax burden. But there are some noteworthy difference. Households with kids enjoy significantly lower tax bur- dens in Germany, France, Luxembourg, Ireland, Por- tugal, Slovenia, and the United States. But you probably do not want to have kids in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. Let’s close with a couple of caveats. First, we are only looking at one slice of tax policy. More specifically, this OECD data measures the tax burden on labor in- come, and it looks at that data only for middle- income workers. It’s also important to consider tax rates upper- income taxpayers since they tend to be the en- trepreneurs and job cre- ators. From this perspec- tive, Belgium had the second-worst tax system for these households, slightly behind Sweden. Nothing to brag about. It’s also important to consider the overall tax burden on saving and in- vestment. And there are several ways of looking at that data. ■■ Most punitive level of double taxation. ■■ Most anti-competitive tax system. ■■ Most onerous tax regime for global companies. Belgium does not get high marks in these indices, but the United States in- variably scores poorly. Last but not least, there are many other policies – such as trade, regulation, and the rule of law – that also help determine a coun- try’s competitiveness. And while Belgium and other European nations have bad fiscal systems, they tend to score highly in other areas. Same for the United States. The real key, of course, is to get good scores in all areas, like Switzerland, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Those are the best jurisdic- tions for workers, with good wages and low tax burdens. Daniel J. Mitchell, chairman of the Center for Freedom and Prosperity, is on the Editorial Board of the Cayman Financial Review. DANIEL J. MITCHELL Antwerp’s 450-year-old City Hall. - PHOTO: WILL HAWKES FOR THE WASHINGTON POST PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY: Caymanian Compass Limited (a subsidiary of Pinnacle Media Ltd) Compass Centre Shedden Road, George Town SEND US YOUR VIEWS OR NEWS: P.O. Box 1365 Grand Cayman KY1-1108, Cayman Islands Telephone: (345) 815-0095 Email: newsdesk@pinnaclemedialtd.com ADVERTISE WITH US: Telephone: (345) 949-5111 Email: sales@pinnaclemedialtd.com Website: www.caymancompass.com PUBLISHERS DAVID R. LEGGE AND VICKI L. LEGGE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF DAVID R. LEGGE EXECUTIVE EDITOR PATRICK BRENDEL A MEMBER OF THE INTER-AMERICAN PRESS ASSOCIATION “Give light and the people will findtheirownway”5 LOCAL NEWS CAYMAN COMPASS • MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 Celebrate Celebrate Celebrate Mother's Mother's Mother's Day Day Day with with with BrunchBrunchBrunch Day Brunch Day Day Day Brunch Day Brunch Day Brunch Day Day Day Brunch Day at at at Brunch at BrunchBrunchBrunch at Brunch at Brunch at BrunchBrunchBrunch at Brunch Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant $45.00 including a glass of Prosecco or Moscato with with with BrunchBrunchBrunch Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Guy Harvey's Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant Restaurant $45.00 $45.00 $45.00 $45.00 including a glass of Prosecco or Moscato Prosecco or Moscato running from 11-3pm, Sunday May 13th 2018 tel: 946-9000 email: info@guyharveysgrill.com Appeals court rules on having gun ‘for one minute’ Sentence for unlicensed firearm reduced to seven years CAROL WINKER cwinker@pinnaclemedialtd.com Torry Javier Powery-Mon- terroso may have had an un- licensed firearm in his hand for only a minute, but the Cayman Islands Court of Ap- peal considered that minute in the context of what else had happened in the early hours of March 25, 2016. Mr. Powery, who will be 21 in June, appeared before the court on Thursday to appeal his sentence of eight years imprisonment, which he re- ceived last year after pleading guilty to possession of an un- licensed handgun with six rounds of ammunition in it. Attorney Clyde Allen sub- mitted that the sentencing judge should have considered the brief time Mr. Powery had the gun as an “exceptional circumstance.” The manda- tory minimum sentence for possessing an unlicensed firearm is seven years unless the court finds some excep- tional factor that can raise or lower the sentence. Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Patrick Moran agreed that, in this case, Mr. Powery had the gun in his hand “for one minute at the most.” The facts as outlined to the sentencing judge agreed that Mr. Powery had been in a van being driven by an- other man. Around 2 a.m., po- lice received a report of two men with a firearm driving around the School Road/ Rock Hole area in a white van. Officers responding to the call saw the vehicle on Edward Street, heading to- ward Shedden Road. They at- tempted to stop it by means of blue lights and siren, but the vehicle continued. As po- lice drove alongside, the van door opened. One of the of- ficers recognized Mr. Powery and saw that he was carrying a silver handgun. Mr. Powery jumped from the vehicle while it was still moving; he stumbled but then ran off. The officer lost sight of him for a few seconds, but then found him and arrested him. He no longer had the gun. A search team was called in but nothing was found. However, the two officers who had first responded con- tinued the search and around 6:24 a.m., they found a shiny silver pistol in dense under- growth behind the prop- erty where Mr. Powery had run. It was a semi-automatic double-action loaded with six 9mm bullets. Remanded in custody, he pleaded guilty in July, 2016. One account Mr. Powery gave was that he was not aware of the gun until it was shoved at him by the driver when the police tried to stop the van. In another account he was aware of the driver bran- dishing the gun and driving around and making threats against someone he had been in an altercation with. He explained that “there was a lot of drama going on” and he had been very intox- icated the night of the in- cident. After talking to a lawyer, he thought he would come to court and give ev- idence, but “I didn’t know what would happen to me at the end of the day …. I didn’t know if that would land me in a bigger situation.” Justice Sir George Newman delivered the court’s decision after consulting with the other two judges, Sir John Goldring and Sir Richard Field. He noted it was as a re- sult of the gun being handed to Mr. Powery that he came into physical possession of it and bolted from the vehicle and disposed of it. By the time he was arrested he did not have the gun nor did he inform police where it was. But that “short photo cameo” of what happened had to be placed in a wider con- text, he said. Mr. Powery had assisted the driver by accom- panying him; when arrested, at least he should have been prepared to indicate where he had disposed of the gun. “In our judgment it is putting too much weight on a very selective aspect of a course of conduct that falls square within the mischief that the legislation is de- signed and aiming to cover. And that is – that those in possession of guns and am- munition should realize that, notwithstanding a very short period of possession, the very moment from which they have knowledge that that is the dilemma or position they are in, it is incumbent upon them to face up to the respon- sibility that they have and they should do everything they can to prevent an armed weapon from falling into the hands of those who would use it for criminal purposes.” Justice Newman endorsed what Mr. Moran had said ear- lier – if you dispose of a gun in a residential area there is a risk it could be found by a young child and there could be terrible consequences. The court commended the officers who had spent a long time searching for the gun. In this context, posses- sion for a short period ran counter to the legislation and the mandatory sentence was designed to deter it. The court reduced the sentence from eight years to seven because of concern that the sentencing judge was not aware of the full facts as they were presented to the appeals court. One account Mr. Powery gave was that he was not aware of the gun until it was shoved at him by the driver when the police tried to stop the van. Man pleads guilty to illegal landing More charges expected, court told CAROL WINKER cwinker@pinnaclemedialtd.com Marlon Crowe, arrested on Thursday morning, ap- peared in Summary Court on Friday afternoon, when he pleaded guilty to il- legal landing. Mr. Crowe, a Jamaican national, by his plea ad- mitted that he had en- tered the Cayman Islands in contravention of the Immigration Law some- time between Oct. 17, 2017 and May 3, 2018. Defense attorney John Furniss told Magistrate Grace Donalds he knew that other charges had been recommended, partic- ularly for breach of a de- portation order. Police sent out a press release on Thursday ad- vising that Mr. Crowe had been arrested at an address on Frank Sound Road. A second man was said to have been arrested also at the location; the charge against him was harboring a fugitive. No mention was made of this person on Friday afternoon. On April 16, police is- sued a request for public assistance in locating Mr. Crowe. He had been de- ported from Cayman in October 2017 after serving a sentence for conspiracy to import 194 pounds of ganja on Feb. 4, 2016. With no previous convictions here or in Jamaica, he re- ceived a sentence of two years 10 months, the least of the three men involved. On Friday, Mr. Furniss advised that his client wished that he could be remanded to Northward Prison, but things were still “full at the inn,” so he would have to stay at the Fairbanks Detention Centre. He asked for the matter to be brought back on Wednesday, May 9. Having pleaded guilty to illegal landing, Mr. Crowe was remanded in custody. The magistrate pointed out that she did not have authority to specify where a detained person should be kept. National Gallery photography show opens Tracy Caudish and Sergio Coni were among the crowd at the Thursday night opening of “Coral Encounters” at the Cayman Islands National Gallery. The exhibit is meant to draw attention to Cayman’s uderwater ecology during the International Year of the Reef. It runs through August 16. - PHOTO: MARK MUCKENFUSS6 LOCAL&REGIONAL MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS Law school moot team competes in Vienna The moot team from the Truman Bodden Law School recently competed in the 25th Annual Willem C. Vis In- ternational Commercial Arbitration Moot in Vienna, Austria. The team com- prised second-year students Aliana Dodds, Oneka Thompson and Romina Kape, accompanied by their coach, An- drew Woodcock. The goal of the Willem C. Vis Interna- tional Commercial Arbitration Moot is: “to foster the study of international com- mercial law and arbitration for resolu- tion of international business disputes through its application to a concrete problem of a client and to train law leaders of tomorrow in methods of alter- native dispute resolution.” The Moot, which took place March 22 to 29, consisted of two stages: Students were firstly required to draft memoranda for both the claimant and the respon- dent; then they were required to make oral submissions based on the memo- randa to different panels of arbitrators. For the oral submission stage, each team participated in a total of four moots. As the competition is geared to- ward both civil and common law ju- risdiction, for each round of both the written and oral submissions, TBLS was paired with a university from a civil law jurisdiction. TBLS competed against schools from the United Arab Emir- ates, Romania, Brazil and Switzerland. The pairings are organized in this way to expose students to the different ap- proaches taken by students training in other legal systems. In participating in the Willem C. Vis Moot, the TBLS students gained experi- ence that can be transferred into their student and future professional careers. Not only did the mooters improve their advocacy skills, they also advanced their legal research skills. “The Vis Moot is an exceptional learning experience in and out of the boardrooms. I am honoured to have been one of the students chosen to represent TBLS and I highly encourage future stu- dents to participate in what I promise will be an unforgettable adventure in the world of advocacy,” said Romina Kape. TBLS was one of the smallest teams in the competition, which comprised in excess of 300 teams, amounting to nearly 3,000 participants. However, this did not hinder the team’s performance and they effectively demonstrated their understanding of the issues arising in the moot problem. The mooters re- ceived positive comments from a number of arbitrators in the feedback segments. Of note, a U.K. solicitor com- mended the team on their eloquence and their ability to persuasively advo- cate the key issues. The students have expressed that not only has the moot allowed them to take what they have learned in the classroom and apply it to a practical scenario, but it has allowed them to be exposed to in- dividuals from diverse backgrounds and to be immersed in a dissimilar environ- ment to that of the Cayman Islands. Oneka Thompson said, “doing the moot was somewhat out of my comfort zone, but I decided that in order to de- velop myself as an individual I had to kill my inhibitions. I was honestly sur- prised by my performance and I felt like I further broke out of my shell with public speaking.” The opportunity for TBLS and the Cayman Islands to be represented at the competition would not have been possible without the support of the Cayman Islands Law Society, Cayman National Bank, the Caymanian Bar asso- ciation, Conyers Dill & Pearman, and the Cayman Islands Government. Haines tackles outback for local food bank CUBA TO HOST COLOMBIA PEACE TALKS WITH ELN REBELS REP ROB BISHOP SAYS HE SUPPORTS STATEHOOD FOR PUERTO RICO Raul Castro’s daughter to push for gay marriage in Cuba Local marathoner Derek Haines, accompanied by daughter Lizzy, completed the arduous Mount Mee Marathon in Australia, to raise funds for the Cayman Islands Good Samar- itan Food Bank. The funds that Derek is raising are earmarked to purchase equipment for the food bank, such as a walk-in refrigerator and walk-in freezer. The marathon course was located about a 1.5- hour drive northwest of Brisbane, in the Mount Mee State Forest and Forest Reserve. More than 20 miles of the 26.2-mile course is on steep forest tracks that were also slippery after early rain with plenty of rocks and branches to trip the unwary. With 47 people partici- pating in last month’s race, the Haineses finished in the top 30, with a time of 5 hours and 40 minutes. Cayman’s recently opened food bank helps more than 200 people per week. Local grocery stores, distributors and restaurants – including Foster’s Food Fair, Progressive Distribu- tors and Topimex – con- tribute the bulk of the food items for the food bank. The food bank repack- ages and distributes the items to various estab- lished food delivery pro- grams, acts as a centralized point for food distribution and helps to coordinate distribution efforts. Any donated food that is not fit for human consump- tion is instead cooked and delivered to the Cayman Is- lands Humane Society. The food bank is seeking additional partners, in- cluding restaurants and hotels, but also businesses that host events that result in leftover food. Donations to Mr. Haines’ fundraising effort for the food bank can be made to the Rotary Club of Grand Cayman, referencing “Food Bank” on the check or on- line transaction field. In- terested people can also contact Naomi@Cayman- FoodBank.com to obtain the Food Bank’s account information. BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) – Colombia’s government and its last major rebel movement have agreed to continue peace talks in Cuba after Ecuador last month withdrew as host for the negotiations. Peace talks with the National Liberation Army had been taking place in Ecuador for more than a year and have been ad- vancing at a slow pace. The two sides issued a statement Saturday saying the next round of talks will focus on re-es- tablishing a cease-fire that expired in January. Cuba played host to peace talks with the much-larger Revolu- tionary Armed Forces of Colombia that con- cluded in 2016 with a his- toric deal paving the way for the demobilization of 7,000 fighters. Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno ended his mediating role last month as violence from Colom- bia’s booming cocaine in- dustry increasingly spills over the border. SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Another Republican offi- cial has declared his sup- port for granting Puerto Rico statehood. U.S. Rep. Rob Bishop of Utah said Friday, how- ever, that the U.S. terri- tory first has to have a vi- brant economy and a stable government. The island is trying to restructure a por- tion of its more than $70 billion public debt load amid an 11-year recession. Bishop visited the is- land with Puerto Rico’s representative in Congress, Jenniffer Gonzalez, who said he has been a great ally as the island strug- gles to recover from Hur- ricane Maria. However, Gov. Ricardo Rossello has previously clashed with Bishop, and his office said he was unable to meet the congressman because his agenda was full on Friday. Bishop also said he will hold an oversight hearing to help make a federal con- trol board overseeing the island’s finances more effi- cient. He is the chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources, which has jurisdiction over U.S. territories. Bishop recently said he was frustrated with what he called the board’s “in- ability and unwilling- ness” to reach consen- sual restructuring deals with creditors. Bishop’s statement comes just days after Florida Gov. Rick Scott also said he supports statehood. HAVANA (AP) – Mariela Castro, a Cuban lawmaker and daughter of Communist Party chief Raul Castro, says she will push for gay mar- riage to be included in a con- stitutional reform process expected to begin in July. The reform is expected to encompass a wide range of modernizing changes to Cuba’s 1976 constitu- tion, which was designed for a Soviet-style command economy. The communist government has been slowly introducing market reforms and trying to encourage more interaction with the global economy. Homosexuality was per- secuted in the years after the 1959 revolution led by the Castro family but Cuba has ended anti-gay policies and forbidden workplace dis- crimination. Mariela Castro has become a prominent gay rights activist. She told reporters Friday that she would ask that the new charter and ac- companying laws allow gay marriage. Truman Bodden Law School students Aliana Dodds, Oneka Thompson and Romina Kape competed in a moot competition in Vienna, Austria, in March. Derek Haines gives a double thumbs-up sign during April’s Mount Mee Marathon in Australia. Mr. Haines competed as part of his fundraising effort for the Cayman Islands Good Samaritan Food Bank. Mariela Castro, director of Cuba’s National Center for Sexual Education, talks with journalists at the end of a press conference, in Havana, Cuba, Friday. - PHOTO: AP7 LOCAL NEWS CAYMAN COMPASS • MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 EDITION BOOKING DEADLINE Monday May 21st NO PUBLICATION Tuesday May 22nd Thursday May 17th Wednesday May 23rd Thursday May 17th Thursday May 24th Friday May 18th Friday May 25th Tuesday May 22nd DISCOVERY DAYDISCOVERY DAYDISCOVERY DAYDISCOVERY DAY Celebrate the long weekend DISCOVERY DAYDISCOVERY DAY May 21st (345) 949-5111 • sales@pinnaclemedialtd.com Please be advised there will be no newspaper on Monday, May 21st, Discovery Day. OUR OFFICE WILL BE CLOSED ON MONDAY PUBLICATION DEADLINES: Man admits firearm, cocaine charges A group of students from Clifton Hunter High School toured the Shedden Road headquarters of Pinnacle Media on Friday. During the afternoon, students learned about all aspects of the company, which publishes the Cayman Compass, an array of magazines and other products. Here, the students speak with Jenny Gabruch, Pinnacle’s managing editor for special publications. – PHOTO: STEPHEN CLARKE Clifton Hunter students tour Pinnacle Media No evidence offered against female defendant CAROL WINKER cwinker@pinnaclemedialtd.com Javier Howell, 26, pleaded guilty on Friday to posses- sion of an unlicensed firearm, six rounds of ammunition and 123 grams of cocaine with intent to supply. He appeared in Grand Court before Justice Michael Wood, who set sentencing for Thursday, May 17. After Mr. Howell en- tered his pleas, senior Crown counsel Candia James said she was offering no evidence against the female defendant, Emily Hanna Patrick. The charge against Ms. Patrick was possession of a single bullet. The judge discharged her and she left the dock. No details were given on Friday, but the matter was extensively aired when it first came to court, on Oct. 17, 2016. Mr. Howell and Ms. Patrick appeared on that date along with another young woman with whom Ms. Pat- rick had shared an apartment at Lantern Point. They had all been arrested three days earlier, when po- lice went to the property looking for Mr. Howell after receiving intelligence. A handgun was found in his vehicle, which was in the parking lot of the complex. The court was told at the time that a single bullet was found in a laundry basket where clothes had been thrown. It was this bullet Ms. Patrick was charged with. Her attorney, Jonathon Hughes, told the court then that Ms. Patrick, 19 at the time, knew nothing about any illegal items; she had simply allowed Mr. Howell to Students raise funds for children’s heart health TOASTMASTERS INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION HELD AT TOWN HALL Students from Little Trotters Farm & Nursery School and St. Ignatius Cath- olic School raised thou- sands of dollars for Hart for Hearts, the pediatric arm of Cayman Heart Fund. The bake sale at Little Trotters and dress-down day at St. Ignatius were organized by Ailian and Sean Evans, parents of baby Nolan Rory Evans, who passed away earlier this year due to con- genital heart defect (CHD) complications. The Little Trotters bake sale raised $370 for the ini- tiative, which helps raise public awareness and pro- vides financial assistance to families in Cayman when their child is born with a congenital heart defect. Ms. Lesley Mad- dock, Little Trotters Farm & Nursery School Man- ager said, “The importance of raising awareness and teaching empathy to chil- dren cannot be measured. We feel honored to be asked to participate in fundraisers such as Hart for Hearts, and hope that we can help to make a difference.” The St. Ignatius “civvy day” raised more than $1,700 and included a presentation by Cayman Heart Fund Di- rector Dr. Christine Chen. St. Ignatius’ Head of Years 7-11 Bernadette Devlin said, “It was a pleasure for us to be able to support such worthy causes. Having the presenters come to school to talk to the children and ex- plain where the money will be used really raised their awareness and motivated them to contribute.” Cayman Heart Fund Coor- dinator Colleen Mellott said, “The students’ efforts are greatly appreciated, which allows us to raise aware- ness of the problems families in Cayman face when their child is born with congenital heart defect.” For more information about the Cayman Heart Fund and Hart for Hearts, call 916-6324 or email info@caymanheartfund.com. On Wednesday evening, nine contestants from Toast- masters clubs based in Grand Cayman competed at the George Town Town Hall in the International Speech and Table Topics Contest. The competition was made of up two contests – the Table Topics Contest and the International Speech Con- test. Toastmasters from the Eminent Orators Club, Grand Cayman Club, Eloquent Speakers Club and Scotia- bank Pioneer Club took part. In the Table Topics Con- test, six of the contestants were each asked: “What does ‘success’ mean to you?” and were given two minutes to talk, having had no knowl- edge of the question before- hand or any time to prepare. The International Speech competition saw six contes- tants, some having also par- ticipated in the Table Topics Contest, speak on a pre- pared topic they had chosen previously for five to seven minutes, with contestants choosing to speak about topics such as emotional abuse, or how you and others view yourself in a mirror. Sashoy Duncan, from the Eminent Orators Club, came first place in the Table Topics Contest and Annick Jackman, from the Grand Cayman Club, came first place in the Interna- tional Speech Contest, making them both eligible to represent Cayman in Haiti later in May. The winner of the District Contest will go to the Inter- national Contest held in Chi- cago in August. In the past, Cayman has done well at the District level, and came third in the Table Topics Contest in Barbados last year. Toastmaster clubs help empower members to perfect their public speaking and leadership skills. Toastmas- ters International has 16,400 clubs with a membership base of more than 352,000 people in 141 countries. For more information about Toastmasters, visit www.toastmasters.org or contact George Ebanks at 322-9369. Toastmaster contestants pose with winners Annick Jackman, center left, and Sashoy Dunkan, center right, who will be heading to Haiti later in May to compete in the District Contest. stay in the apartment. The other woman, Alex- andra Stasiuk, was charged with possession of 10 bullets after a bag containing them was found in her bedroom. This charge against Ms. Sta- siuk was dismissed at a stage of proceedings in Summary Court. She was 20 when she first appeared in court. The allegations against Mr. Howell at the time were that a handgun, rounds of ammuni- tion and cocaine were found his vehicle. The weight of the illegal drug was not imme- diately known, but it turned out to be 123 grams, which is more than four ounces. Attorney Lee Halliday- Davis suggested that a social inquiry report would not be requested for Mr. Howell be- fore sentencing because there was sufficient information in his file. Justice Wood agreed. He continued this defen- dant’s remand in custody until May 17.8 LOCAL&REGIONAL MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 • CAYMAN COMPASS Legal department blames Operation Tempura for $2.7M consultant bill Kernohan’s 2009 wrongful termination lawsuit against the government, which was not settled until 2014. A separate case where Mr. Kernohan brought proceedings against Operation Tempura’s former lead investigator Martin Bridger, also settled out of court in 2015. There were two other matters brought against Mr. Bridger in the U.K. by former Royal Cayman Islands Po- lice Commissioner David Ba- ines regarding the recovery of documents Mr. Baines believed Mr. Bridger held. Those cases were heard be- fore the U.K. High Court in 2012 and 2014. “There was a long his- tory to these proceedings,” Ms. Sharma said. “Does anybody know the total cost of [Operation] Tempura to this country?” Mr. Miller asked. Ms. Sharma responded that she had read the total cost was “in the region” of $10 mil- lion, but added she was “not in a position to confirm that.” The Cayman Compass has determined via open re- cords requests and other publicly available documents that well over $10 million has been spent on the Operation Tempura probe since it began in September 2007. However, it is likely that millions more in Tempura- related expenditures have never been made known. The auditor general’s of- fice has previously reported that the corruption investi- gation spent $5.7 million be- tween September 2007 and January 2009. The office also estimated another $1.1 mil- lion was spent from February 2009 to June 2009. Any costs of operating the investigation [officers’ sala- ries, housing, plane tickets, car allowances, etc.] were not measured beyond June 2009, because subsequent auditors declined to review any fur- ther expenditures. The Compass also found that more than $3.1 million was spent on legal settle- ments and attorneys fees re- lated to Tempura. The wrongful arrest of former Grand Court Jus- tice Alex Henderson during the Tempura investigation cost government $1.275 mil- lion to settle in 2008. How- ever, details of other settle- ments reached with former RCIPS Police Commissioner Kernohan, former Deputy Commissioner Rudi Dixon and retired Police Inspector Burmon Scott were never made public due to various non-disclosure agreements. Legal bills for other mat- ters cost nearly $1.8 million as of early 2014, but the fig- ures reviewed Thursday by the solicitor general have now eclipsed that expense. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 NASA launches InSight spacecraft to Mars to dig down deep CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) – A robotic geologist armed with a hammer and quake monitor rocketed toward Mars on Sat- urday, aiming to land on the red planet and explore its mysterious insides. In a twist, NASA launched the Mars InSight lander from California rather than Flori- da’s Cape Canaveral. It was the first interplanetary mis- sion ever to depart from the West Coast, drawing pre- dawn crowds to fog-socked Vandenberg Air Force Base and rocket watchers down the California coast into Baja. “This is a big day. We’re going back to Mars!” NASA’s new boss, Jim Bridenstine, said following liftoff. “This is an extraordinary mission with a whole host of firsts.” The spacecraft will take more than six months to get to Mars and start its un- precedented geologic excava- tions, traveling 300 million miles (485 million kilometers) to get there. InSight will dig deeper into Mars than ever before – nearly 16 feet, or 5 meters – to take the planet’s tempera- ture. It will also attempt to make the first measurements of marsquakes, using a high- tech seismometer placed di- rectly on the Martian surface. “That’s the real payoff of this whole mission and that’s still lying ahead of us,” said the mission’s chief scien- tist, Bruce Banerdt of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Although fog prevented Banerdt from seeing the liftoff of the $1 billion U.S.-European mission, he heard the roar of the rocket and all the blaring car alarms it set off. “It was just an incredible moment,” Banerdt told The Associated Press by phone. Despite the challenges still ahead, “I think I can bask in a little bit of satisfaction and just feeling like we really ac- complished something today.” Besides InSight, the United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket gave a lift to a pair of mini test satellites, or CubeSats, that are trailing InSight to Mars to serve as a potential communication link. Nicknamed WALL-E and EVE from the 2008 animated movie, the twin briefcase-size spacecraft popped off the rocket’s upper stage in hot pursuit of InSight, as elated launch controllers applauded and shook hands following the morning’s success. NASA has not put a space- craft down on Mars since the Curiosity rover in 2012. The U.S., in fact, is the only country to successfully land and operate a spacecraft at Mars. It’s tough, complicated stuff. Only about 40 percent of all missions to Mars from all countries – orbiters and landers alike – have proven successful over the decades. If all goes well, the three- legged InSight will descend by parachute and engine fir- ings onto a flat equatorial re- gion of Mars – believed to be free of big, potentially dan- gerous rocks – on Nov. 26. Once down, it will stay put, using a mechanical arm to place the science instru- ments on the surface. Banerdt said Mars is ideal for learning how the rocky planets of our solar system formed 4.5 billion years ago. Unlike our active Earth, Mars has not been transformed by plate tec- tonics and other processes, he noted. InSight might also help explain why some planets – like ours – went on to develop life, while others did not. Over the course of two Earth years – or one Mar- tian year – NASA expects InSight’s three main exper- iments to provide a true 3-D image of the interior of Mars. Scientists know Mars has an iron core and a crust, but beyond that, the inside is “basically, completely un- known,” said Banerdt. The lander is equipped with a seismometer for measuring marsquakes, a self-hammering probe for burrowing beneath the sur- face, and a radio system for tracking the spacecraft’s po- sition and planet’s wobbly rotation, thereby revealing the size and composition of Mars’ core. “InSight, for seismologists, will really be a piece of his- tory, a new page of history,” said the Paris Institute of Earth Physics’ Philippe Lo- gnonne, lead scientist of the InSight seismometer. Problems with the French- supplied seismometer kept InSight from launching two years ago. California was al- ways part of the plan. NASA normally launches from Cape Canaveral, but de- cided to switch to California for InSight to take advantage of a shorter flight backlog. This was the first U.S. inter- planetary mission to launch from somewhere other than Cape Canaveral. The fog ruined the view for those gathered at Van- denberg along the central California coast. But it was a marvelous sight farther south. The rocket’s bright or- ange flame was visible for some time as it arced upward across the dark sky west of greater Los Angeles. Not even two weeks on the job, NASA’s new adminis- trator, Bridenstine, observed the launch on monitors at space agency headquarters in Washington. “I can’t think of a better way to start my day!” Briden- stine tweeted. United Launch Alliance’s president, Tory Bruno, also took to Twitter to celebrate. “Next stop: Mars.” An artist’s rendering of the twin Mars Cube One spacecraft flying over Mars with Earth in the distance. - PHOTO: NASA/JPL-CALTECH Egypt says no hidden rooms in King Tut’s tomb after all CAIRO (AP) – New radar scans have provided con- clusive evidence that there are no hidden rooms inside King Tutankhamun’s burial chamber, Egypt’s antiqui- ties ministry said Sunday, bringing a disappointing end to years of excitement over the prospect. Mostafa Waziri, Sec- retary General of the Su- preme Council of Antiquities, said an Italian team con- ducted extensive studies with ground-penetrating radar that showed the tomb did not contain any hidden, man- made blocking walls as was earlier suspected. Francesco Porcelli of the Polytechnic University of Turin presented the findings at an interna- tional conference in Cairo. “Our work shows in a con- clusive manner that there are no hidden chambers, no cor- ridors adjacent to Tutankha- mun’s tomb,” Porcelli said, “As you know there was a theory that argued the possible exis- tence of these chambers but unfortunately our work is not supporting this theory.” In 2015, British Egyptolo- gist Nicholas Reeves proposed, after analysis of high-defini- tion laser scans, that queen Nefertiti’s tomb could be con- cealed behind wall paintings in the famed boy king’s burial chamber. The discovery ig- nited massive interest, with officials first rushing to sup- port the theory but then later distancing themselves and ul- timately rejecting it. The ministry says two previous scans by Japanese and American scientists had proved inconclusive, but in- sists this latest ground-pen- etrating radar data closes the lid on the tomb having such hidden secrets. “It is concluded, with a very high degree of confi- dence, said Dr. Porcelli, the hypothesis concerning the existence of hidden chambers or corridors adjacent to Tut- ankhamun’s tomb is not sup- ported by the GPR data,” it said in its statement. The ministry has been gradually moving King Tut’s belongings to a new museum outside Cairo near the Giza Pyramids to undergo resto- ration before they are put on display. The transfer of the priceless belongings has be- come a particularly sensitive issue; In 2014 the beard at- tached to the ancient Egyp- tian monarch’s golden mask was accidentally knocked off and hastily reattached with an epoxy glue compound, sparking uproar among archaeologists. The fourth International Tutankhamun Conference in Cairo where Porcelli pre- sented the findings, the most extensive radar survey of the site to date, was attended by a wide range of Egyptolo- gists and archaeologists from the world over. During the conference, Antiquities Minister Khaled al-Anani said that the first phase of the new museum, including King Tut’s halls, will be completed by the end of this year but the date for the museum’s “soft opening” has yet to be decided. The museum currently hosts more than 43,200 artifacts of which over 4,500 belong to King Tut alone, and its grand opening is planned for 2022. Radar experts scan a wall in King Tutankhamun’s burial chamber in the Valley of the Kings, Luxor, Egypt, in 2016. - PHOTO: APCAYMAN COMPASS • MONDAY MAY 7, 2018 The islands’ most-trusted news source 9 Bombing at mosque in Afghanistan kills 12 A bomb blast inside a mosque in eastern Afghanistan that was being used as a voter registration center killed at least 12 people and wounded 33, officials said. The attack took place in the city of Khost, the capital of the province of the same name. Billions on the line for firms as Trump weighs Iran pullout DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – From airplanes to oilfields, billions of dollars are on the line for international corpo- rations as President Donald Trump weighs whether to pull America out of Iran’s nu- clear deal with world powers. Regardless of where they are headquartered, virtually all multinational corpora- tions do business or banking in the U.S., meaning any re- turn to pre-deal sanctions could torpedo deals made after the 2015 agreement came into force. That threat alone has been enough to scare risk-averse firms, like Boeing Co., into slow-walking deals agreed to months ago. A complete pullout by the U.S. would wreak further havoc and likely frighten off those con- sidering making the plunge. “I absolutely think those on the fence will not jump in,” said Richard Nephew, a former sanctions expert at the U.S. State Depart- ment who worked on the nu- clear deal and now is at New York’s Columbia University. “The only ones who will, will be those who see tremen- dous monetary benefit and no U.S. risk.” The 2015 Iran nuclear deal lifted crippling eco- nomic sanctions that had locked Iran out of interna- tional banking and the global oil trade. In return, Tehran limited its enrichment of ura- nium, reconfigured a heavy- water reactor so it could not produce plutonium and re- duced its uranium stockpile and supply of centrifuges. For Western businesses, the deal meant access to Iran’s largely untapped market of 80 million people. Most prominently, air- plane manufacturers rushed in to replace the country’s dangerously dilapidated civilian fleet. In December 2016, Airbus Group signed a deal with Iran’s national carrier, Ira- nAir, to sell it 100 airplanes for around $19 billion at list prices. Boeing later struck its own deal with IranAir for 80 aircraft with a list price of some $17 billion, promising that deliveries would begin in 2017 and run until 2025. Boeing separately struck an- other 30-airplane deal with Iran’s Aseman Airlines for $3 billion at list prices. But Boeing has yet to de- liver a single aircraft to Iran. The Chicago-based compa- ny’s CEO recently stressed it understands the “risks and implications around the Ira- nian aircraft deal,” which would be the biggest busi- ness agreement between an American company and Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution and U.S. Em- bassy takeover. Airbus, a European air- line consortium based in Toulouse, France, likewise continues its sales at the dis- cretion of the American gov- ernment. At least 10 percent of its aircraft components are of American origin, meaning it requires permission from the U.S. Treasury for its sales to Iran. Airbus has already delivered two A330-200s and one A321 to Iran. Airbus declined to com- ment when asked by The Associated Press about its possible plans ahead of Trump’s decision. European airplane man- ufacturer ATR struck a $536-million deal with Ira- nAir for at least 20 aircraft last year. It’s already has de- livered eight of its twin-en- gine turboprops to Tehran after earlier winning permis- sion from the U.S. Treasury. The speed at which Western airplane manufac- turers went into Iran is con- trasted by a slow start by Western energy firms despite the country’s vast oil and gas wealth. The exception is French oil giant Total SA, which in July signed a $5 bil- lion, 20-year agreement with Iran and a Chinese oil com- pany to develop the coun- try’s massive South Pars off- shore natural gas field. The natural gas pumped by the deal will go toward Iran’s do- mestic market. The deal marked a re- turn to Iran for Total, which pulled out of the country in 2008 as Western sanctions over its nuclear program began to ramp up. Total did not respond to requests for comment, though its CEO Patrick Pouyanne reportedly told Trump in February to stick with the deal. “If the framework, the rules of the game, change, of course we will have to re- evaluate,” Pouyanne told the Financial Times. French carmaker PSA Peu- geot Citroen reached a deal in 2016 to open a plant pro- ducing 200,000 vehicles an- nually in Iran. Peugeot, once a major player in Iran’s car market before sanctions, did not respond to a re- quest for comment. Meanwhile, fellow French automobile manufacturer Groupe Renault signed a $778-million deal to build 150,000 cars a year at a fac- tory outside of Tehran. A worker in a natural gas refinery in the South Pars gas field in Asalouyeh, Iran. From airplanes to oilfields, billions of dollars stand on the line for international corporations as President Donald Trump weighs whether to pull America out of Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers. - PHOTO: AP Israeli PM steps up calls to end Iranian nuclear deal GIULIANI NOT RULING OUT CHANCE OF TRUMP TAKING THE FIFTH JERUSALEM (AP) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netan- yahu on Sunday stepped up his calls to end the Ira- nian nuclear deal as Presi- dent Donald Trump weighs whether to withdraw the United States from the 2015 agreement. In a briefing to foreign reporters Netanyahu said “a deal that enables Iran to keep and hide all its nuclear weapons know-how, is a horrible deal.” The deal “has to be either fully fixed or fully nixed,” he said. “But if you do nothing to this deal, if you keep it as is, you will end up with Iran with a nuclear arsenal in a very short time,” he said. Trump faces a May 12 deadline over whether to up- hold 2015 nuclear deal, which he long has criticized. Netanyahu is an out- spoken opponent of the deal, which requires Iran to limit its nuclear enrichment in ex- change for the lifting of in- ternational sanctions. Netan- yahu says the deal will not prevent Iran, Israel’s bitter enemy, from reaching nuclear weapons capability. Last week, Netanyahu said a “half ton” of Iranian nuclear documents seized by Israeli intelligence revealed that Iran had lied about its past efforts to produce nuclear weapons. He did not provide any evidence that Iran has vi- olated the 2015 nuclear deal, but said the documents prove Tehran cannot be trusted. Netanyahu said Is- rael is passing on the find- ings “to the main intelli- gence services.” European countries, which have been pressing Trump to stick with the deal, have said Netanya- hu’s presentation only rein- forced the importance of the agreement, which provides for inspections. Earlier, Netanyahu ac- cused Iran of supplying ad- vanced weapons to Syria that pose a danger to Israel, saying it’s better to confront Tehran sooner rather than later. Israel has repeatedly warned it will not tolerate a lasting Iranian military presence in neighboring Syria, and is believed to have been behind recent air- strikes on Syrian military bases that killed Iranian sol- diers, prompting Tehran to vow retaliation. Israel has neither confirmed nor de- nied involvement. Netanyahu told the Israeli Cabinet that Iran has deliv- ered advanced weapons to Syria “in order to attack us both on the battlefield and on the home front.” “We are determined to block Iran’s aggression against us even if this means a struggle. Better now than later,” he said. “We do not want escalation, but we are prepared for any scenario.” Rudy Giuliani, an attorney for President Donald Trump, speaks at the Iran Freedom Convention for Human Rights and democracy Saturday in Washington. - PHOTO: AP WASHINGTON (AP) – Presi- dent Donald Trump’s new at- torney, Rudy Giuliani, will not rule out the possibility that the president would as- sert his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimina- tion in the swirling Russia investigation. “How could I ever be con- fident of that?” the former New York City mayor and U.S. attorney said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” Giuliani said despite Trump’s openness to sit down with special counsel Robert Mueller, he would strongly advise Trump against it. “I’m going to walk him into a prosecution for per- jury like Martha Stewart?” Giuliani said. Stewart was convicted in 2004 of lying to investigators and obstruction in an insider trading case. Giuliani suggested that Trump would not necessarily comply with a subpoena from Mueller, but he wouldn’t rule out the possibility of the president sitting for an inter- view with Mueller. “He’s the president of the United States,” Giuliani said. “We can assert the same priv- ileges other presidents have.” A subpoena fight would likely find its way to the Su- preme Court, which has never firmly decided whether presidents can be compelled to speak under oath. During Watergate, the court ruled that a presi- dent could be compelled to comply with a subpoena for tapes and documents. President Bill Clinton sat voluntarily with indepen- dent prosecutor Ken Starr after being issued a sub- poena to discuss his rela- tionship with former White House intern Monica Le- winsky, avoiding the consti- tutional question. Giuliani’s latest inter- view comes after days of conflicting statements about the investigations into the president. Giuliani, who was hired by Trump last month, said he’s still learning the facts of the Mueller case and the de- tails of Trump’s knowledge of a $130,000 hush payment to adult-film actress Stormy Daniels, who has alleged a sexual tryst with Trump in 2006. The payment was made by Trump personal attorney Michael Cohen days before the 2016 election.Next >