Miami judge gives G.O.B. big victory in B.T.L. case

The fifty-five page verdict began transmitting from the chambers of U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro-Benages shortly after one o’clock this afternoon, Miami time. And by the time the fax machine stopped, it was apparent that contrary to her earlier rulings and attitude, the judge had delivered an unequivocal vindication of the actions of the Government of Belize with regard to its handling of Belize Telecommunications Limited. Essentially, Ungaro found that Jeffrey Prosser’s Innovative Communication Company had failed to prove that government violated the terms of the share pledge agreement or the Florida Uniform Commercial Code when it repossessed I.C.C.’s B.T.L. shares and took control of the B.T.L. board. Prosser had failed to make good on a fifty-two million U.S. dollar promissory note to buy the shares. As a consequence of finding that government had acted within its rights, the judge vacated the preliminary injunction she had granted in March, thus freeing G.O.B. from any court imposed restrictions on how it may dispose of its shares. Today News Five’s Stewart Krohn spoke to attorney Juan Enjamio, one of the three U.S. lawyers who argued the case on behalf of government.

Juan Enjamio, U.S. Attorney for Belize Government
?The government today won a clear victory in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida and we are obviously very, very happy about that.?

Stewart Krohn
?Looking at the judge?s written opinion, for those who have followed the case, it looks like she?s done almost a hundred and eighty degree turn about, both in attitude and in the decision that she?s rendered. How would you explain this??

Juan Enjamio
?Well I think?you need to understand that what happened early in the case, what?s called a preliminary injunction hearing, where there was no discovery, where in essence it was not a full blown trial. And it?s just what we said before, a preliminary proceeding. At trial we had the opportunity to flesh out all the issues, to have more witnesses, we had witnesses associated with the government that provided testimony. I think it was an opportunity to present the case in its totality, do expert testimony, to develop the arguments, and we always felt confident that when we had that opportunity to go to a trial and to actually have all of the arguments fleshed out, that the government would be able to prevail.?

Stewart Krohn
?Understanding that though, it certainly looked like her attitude early on in the trial signalled that you guys were going to have a rough time. Were you worried??

Juan Enjamio
?I?m always worried when I have a case. Obviously it?s a very difficult case. Obviously the other side spent a lot of resources trying to prosecute this case. You know that they were asking for over twenty million dollars in damages, I mean it was a very?in that sense it was a very serious case, so from that standpoint obviously you are always concerned about a case like that.?

Stewart Krohn
?What was the thing that you think swung it for your side in the trial??

Juan Enjamio
?Well I think there was a lot of great testimony. For example, I know Minister Fonseca, finally we were able to get his testimony introduced at trial; I felt that was very important. The testimony of Mr. Aguilar was quoted in the opinion by the Judge. I think there were certain issues where that was very important.?

Stewart Krohn
?Essentially, as far as the Government of Belize and B.T.L. now goes, are they now free to do what they want with B.T.L.?

Juan Enjamio
?Certainly. There is no injunction from the court as of right now. The preliminary injunction that had been entered by the court has been vacated and the judge declined, refused to enter a permanent injunction. So there is no order from the court in the Southern District of Florida that requires the Government to do anything?or that prohibits the Government from doing anything.?

Stewart Krohn
?According to your interpretation then, what is the distribution of seats on the board of directors??

Juan Enjamio
?Well you know, Mr. Krohn right now I haven?t had a chance to study this opinion in its totality. I think it is what the Government always maintained, but on that particular question I would have to just go back and just review the issues a little bit closer because we?ve gotten this order and have been reviewing it very closely. But certainly I will say this, the distribution that had been in effect based on the prior order from the Southern District of Florida, no longer applies.?

Stewart Krohn
?The big question that all of us here as tax paying citizens want to know is what is the status of the status of fifty thousand dollar per day contempt fine that the judge issued way back in March I think it was??

Juan Enjamio
?This order did not address that directly, so it?s impossible from this order to read exactly what that means. I do think though that it strengthens our argument that certainly that should not have been in effect and obviously that will have to be addressed before the district court and perhaps other courts in the very near future. But this order did not address that directly. Certainly this order vindicates a lot of our arguments all along in this case that the government had acted correctly.?

Stewart Krohn
?Now separately from this legal action, they have also invoked an arbitration clause that they had with the Government of Belize. Will this ruling affect that procedure in anyway??

Juan Enjamio
?It may. Certainly it may impact a lot of arguments or the factual allegations that were raised there. As I recall the arbitration proceeding, they tried to make some allegations that evolve from this case. So to the extent that those allegations and that this court has now found those allegations, or some of them, without merit, I certainly think it will have an impact on that.?

The judge ruled in favour of Prosser on only one minor point: that is G.O.B.’s failure to credit several million dollars in loan payments towards its share purchase. The damages awarded, however, are nominal. The other U.S. lawyers appearing for G.O.B. were Barry Davidson and Jane Moskowitz. In contrast to its usual barrage of press releases concerning developments in the B.T.L. case, as of news time Jeffrey Prosser’s public relations machinery was silent on today’s ruling. It is not unlikely that Prosser will appeal the court’s decision.