Michael Peyrefitte Met Lev Dermen; Denies Taking Bribes

Lev Dermen

Attorney General Michael Peyrefitte says he met the infamous fraudster, Lev Dermen, through former P.U.P. Minister Ralph Fonseca.  Dermen’s name has appeared in all major headlines last week, causing the Barrow administration a searing migraine.  A criminal case in the U.S. is threatening to rock the U.D.P. government, as a former business partner of Dermen has accused a U.D.P. minister and a government official of taking financial bribes from Dermen, who is accused of leading a five hundred million-dollar tax fraud against the I.R.S.  After the media widely reported on the impending revelation, Prime Minister Dean Barrow quickly called a press conference in which he said he would fire the cabinet minister who took twenty-five thousand dollars monthly from Dermen. Those present denied the taking bribes and so did Attorney General Michel Peyrefitte who was not a government minister at the time.

Michael Peyrefitte

Michael Peyrefitte, Attorney General of Belize

“I met him casually once through my very good friend the Honourable Ralph Fonseca (who) introduced me to Mr. Dermen as a person who was interest in doing business in Belize. I met him. I shook his hand but I have never done business with him, never had any interaction with him other than just than ‘hi, this is Mr. Deremen. He is in Belize and he is doing interest in doing business in Belize’. I certainly did not receive any twenty five thousand dollars a month from him. I wasn’t even a minister then but then people sometimes don’t even make the distinction. Peyrefitte is a minister now so he must have been a minister then. When you want to attack you just attack with no sense and sensibility sometimes so let me take myself out of the equation once and for all even if I wasn’t in it.”

Reporter

“Nothing from him or from his associates?”

Michael Peyrefitte

“Absolutely not. My cheques are signed by the Government of People.”