In April of 2008, former Health Minister and two term PUP Caribbean Shores Area Representative Jose Coye along with his driver Cornel Flowers were charged for theft and obtaining property by deception. That was on the strength of an affidavit from businessman Alfred Schakron who claimed he gave Coye and Flowers $575,000 on the understanding that he get the Putt Putt property – which was government property – under lease at the time.
In June of 2008, Schakron wrote the DPP asking to drop the charges. She did and while that should have been the end of it – it wasn’t. Coye feeling that he had been wronged and his name dragged unfairly through the mud filed a lawsuit against Schakron for malicious prosecution. It’s not the kind of thing that goes to court very regularly but the former Minister and Area Representative is seeking monetary compensation – including $50,000 in legal fees. The trial started yesterday and ended today.
And in a development surely to be filed under the law of unintended consequences, a major revelation was made today with the allegation by Schakron that 7 years ago –he paid Coye $10,000 to facilitate the sale of another piece of land. It is big news because according to Schakron’s lead attorney, Senior Counsel Rodwell Williams, they have the returned check made out in Joe Coye’s name as proof.
Rodwell Williams, Attorney for Alfred Schakron
“Our position that there was prior dealing apart from this specific
case with regard to the Putt Putt land it turned out that Mr. Alfred Schakron was able to obtain from his bank a check, a copy of a check for $10,000 payable to Jose Coye and another check for another amount payable to Mr. Cornel Flowers. Those payments were made, we understand, not relation to that transaction but prior dealing.”
Keith Swift,
“Is that concerning the property on Seashore Drive?”
Rodwell Williams,
“I am sure you are aware that is what he said. It was paid in relation to a parcel of land on Seashore Drive that Mr. Coye had facilitated for him.”
There was a problem admitting the check into evidence because it was a photocopy and it was not in the disclosure. The trial however proceeded with Coye as the only witness for the claimant and Schakron as the only witness for the defendant.
