TCC Principal’s Comment on Treasury Theft Surprises Fin Sec

Joseph Waight

Treasury Department Second Class Clerk David Enriquez was charged last week for theft. The police say that he diverted monies, four hundred and fifty thousand dollars, meant for Toledo Community College into accounts to which he had access. But tonight the plot thickens. News Five has been able to confirm with Principal of TCC, Harriet Lino, that the report is false. She told us today that obviously TCC’s name was used just to facilitate the theft. To drive home that information, TCC also issued a release in which it states that, “At no time did the school not receive its monthly subvention from the Ministry of Education.” That news came as quite a surprise to Financial Secretary Joseph Waight.

Joseph Waight, Financial Secretary

“At no time did the school not receive its monthly subvention from the Ministry of Education. Well, okay…this is again more news as we go along. We were misled into thinking that they did not receive the money based on information that they provided us. If there’s more information, we’ll certainly keep looking into it and it adds another aspect, another dimension to the story.”

Reporter

“Sir so what this would mean to the layman…if TCC did receive their money, then where did the four hundred and fifty, five hundred thousand come from?”

Joseph Waight

“It points us in another direction. Information we got out of the system had TCC’s name on it. When we enquired from TCC they sent us a spreadsheet showing a gap, and we thought the dots were connected at that stage. Now they’re saying something else. Again its early days…this is a surprise to me. We’ll continue to look and I thank you for the information. We’ll continue to look to see in what direction this is going.”

Reporter

“Sir is there a concern from the Treasury Department and the Ministry of Finance that this is not the end of it? That there could have been…if he did this so easily…that he might have done other transactions in 2013, 2014…maybe other persons have done other transactions that haven’t been found?”

Joseph Waight

“Indeed. I mean we’re hoping this is the end of it but we just don’t know. We’ll continue looking to see what the story is. It could be…and I’m hoping not…it could be the tip of the iceberg.”

Waight reiterated that the Ministry of Finance is taking the situation very seriously, and this new information will result in a widening of the scope of an ongoing investigation.