Gabby Affif acquitted in passport scandal

Belize City businessman Gabby Affif is a free man tonight following a not guilty verdict handed down in the passport scandal. The jury of six women and three men began their deliberations at a quarter to one this afternoon and in less than four hours, had made their decision. Outside the courtroom, News Five spoke with a beaten … but not broken Director of Public Prosecutions.

Kirk Anderson, D.P.P.
?Well things never often go in life as you plan, but we respect the jury?s deliberations and the verdict. It?s the verdict of a jury of nine persons and that is the verdict that they?ve come to, that is the system of justice that we have.?

Alfonso Noble, Channel 7
?There?s still another person out there, will you all be considering that person for criminal charges as you did with Mr. Affif??

Kirk Anderson
?Yes, well we would await his return to the country. Once he returns, the law allows for us to try. So we are awaiting to see if he will return.?

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
?Mr. Affif, any words sir now that?s you?ve been found not guilty??

Gabby Affif, Acquitted
?No comment, no comment. You can speak with my lawyer, he will explain to you everything and with the jury they will explain everything.?

Simeon Sampson, Attorney
?Of course it went as we expected. From the word get-go, after analysis of evidence, myself, Mr. Ellis, Mr. Chebat, we teamed up, this was a perfect team. Myself, Chebat and Mr. Ellis Arnold that is, we did do in my opinion, a cooperative heavy defence and it prevailed with the jury as you saw happen awhile ago. Earlier, one of the defence attorneys was delegated to do a no case submission. I did the no case submission in respect of all the sixteen. I would have liked for all the sixteen counts to be thrown out, but we succeeded in just ten being thrown out, as a result of a successful no case submission on those ten counts, so leaving only the six remaining counts for the deliberation of the jury. That was what happened.?

Kendra Griffith
?Mr. Sampson what do you think really worked in your favour that the jury found Mr. Affif not guilty.?

Simeon Sampson
?Well what worked in our favour was the fact that there were only two witnesses upon which the prosecution relied. And both witnesses, the substance of their evidence was not consistent. In respect to Max Santos for example, in one breath he was saying one thing, in the other breath when I was cross-examining him he said this girl was all by herself, the secretary, way to the back, but in examination he said that my client was there beside you as if leaning over her shoulder, so I think the jury saw all that. Then not only that, Miss Ursula Hill confessed upon immunity. She was offered immunity, she could not be prosecuted at all, admitting that she had committed a crime that was the basis of her being given immunity. But she said, I did this on my own. Gabby Affif, to my knowledge, was not party to what nonsense I was doing, criminal nonsense I was doing and my client corroborated that in his statement on the dock to the jury and that was what created the doubt in my view in the minds of the jury.?

The case against Gabby Affif was one of the longest on record, having consumed the court for more than five weeks. Affif had initially been charged with sixteen counts including possession of forged official documents, abetment to forge official documents and abetment to the forgery of forged official documents. But during his summation to the jury today, Justice Lucas told the members to concentrate their deliberations on only six counts, indictments that referred to only two persons, Ta-Chang Wang and Shou-Jung Wang, because the defence had been successful in having ten of the counts dismissed during the trial.