Dawn Ritch, Columnist

I used to look forward to the pleasure of meeting policemen because my respect for them knew no bounds.

This has completely changed. I still get out of the vehicle when stopped, my papers are still not in order, a disc is prominently displayed on the windshield exactly according to law, and I regret that I'm now carrying a driver's licence. I used to leave it locked up in a filing cabinet.

Off-duty police are the most meddlesome. They have an insolent familiarity that ought properly to be dismissed with instant and silent contempt. That got me written up in the station book once. But I really am not interested in who a policeman is when he's not at work. And nothing could induce me to care.

Off-duty policeman

I'm told it was an off-duty policeman who recognised Nicole Fullerton at the Norman Manley International Airport about to get on a trip last week. Now, there's a ready-made busy-body for you. Proof positive that it pays to keep one's photograph out of the papers.

Here's somebody out on bail, her travel documents and passport in her own possession. And here's a man without a life making airport authorities call the courthouse to see if she's allowed to travel, and locking her up overnight until it is the judge's pleasure to see her next day.

Senior Resident Magistrate Judith Pusey, who had responsibility for the case, released Miss Fullerton the next day. Weirdly, the judge commended the airport police for their admirable caution, though she neglected to mention the legality of the action.

Apparently, the only thing worse than being a controversial columnist, is being the daughter of the chief executive officer and owner of a failed financial institution.

Judge Pusey found her guilty as acting operations manager of one of her father's failed entities. The judge believed the claimant that Miss Fullerton had harangued him over the Christmas season for three consecutive days, to help her make up a deposit to the Bank of Jamaica with his big sums.

Miss Fullerton's passport expired in 2004, and she applied and was issued with a new one. Foolish girl to believe she still had the right to leave the island under the Constitution until the case had been completed and an appeal heard. That right is contained under the Judicature (Resident Magistrate's) Act.

No, Miss Fullerton had to spend the night in jail, just like her father, Henry Fullerton, who was arrested and jailed on a Friday afternoon. As a consequence, he had to spend the whole weekend in jail, although he had cancer.

Miss Fullerton was granted bail in the sum of $6 million from 1999. She was allowed to keep her travel documents and had made many trips abroad and returned over the last seven years while her life has been put on hold by the courts.

Judgement

The court found that she was not a member of the board of directors of any Caldron firm. Yet, in her judgement, Pusey wrote: "It may be instructive to begin with the accused's evidence. She is an experienced person in the investment industry. She is careful and precise and attentive to detail. She is the daughter of the CEO of both Caldon entities ..."

Could young Miss Fullerton have been convicted because she is her father's daughter? Are the 'sins' of the father to be visited upon the sons?

The judgment continues: "What is her evidence of the health of the entities? She knows nothing about it? She is not a director. She does not do accounts for the entities. What she cannot deny is that she was a member of the senior management cadre."

There must have been several other members of this cadre. Why was Miss Fullerton singled out when her role was that of 'acting operations manager?'

If the court finds something amiss with the documentation, Miss Fullerton was no lawyer. She was also only there in an acting capacity, and could not have had any real standing in any matter - least of all fraud.

Amazingly, the judgement also states: "The court believes she had every intention of repaying the sum at the interest rates written by the complainant on the back of the receipts."

Why, oh why then jail her? It is my understanding of the law that one of the ingredients of the charges is that the accused must intend to deprive the complainant permanently of his money, whether by conversion or by larceny.

Is it because the claimant, a relative by marriage, claims the accused went to a "Parisian finishing school?" When cross-examined by the defence on his comment he irritably replied, "I have no time for that."

How can a man who has that class of money to invest, and with real property besides, be described by Judge Pusey as "a reasonably clever businessman but unschooled in the finer arts of business?"

In her judgement, she stated under 'Findings of Fact' 4: "The complainant was a businessman engaged in various activities - supermarket and gas station operation, rental of trucks and bikes and airplanes." He seems to be quite a businessman. Certainly, this alone would make any reasonable person conclude that he was versed in all kinds of financial arrangements, including leases and negotiable instruments. After all, its not easy to own and rent an airplane.

Financial Virgin

Despite this, the court concluded that the claimant was a financial virgin in negotiable instruments (my phrase). Miss Fullerton is, therefore, guilty of seducing him into her net before her father's publicly-listed financial companies went into voluntary liquidation.

The judgement also noted: "He (the claimant) was, therefore, very, very, interested in interest, contrary to what he sought to establish. The Court did not accept this view ... "

Under the 'Reasons for Decision,' the judge noted that Miss Fullerton was her father's daughter. I find this horrifying beyond the shadow of a doubt. This is a fraud case, not a class case.

The judge says of the complainant. "He was an outcast," as if it can possibly matter in a so-called financial fraud case. It cannot matter whether or not the parties to the suit went to a Parisian finishing school, or were outcasts in the family - even outcasts with airplanes.

It seems to me that the judge just discovered commercial paper and wasn't willing to credit such sophistication to the claimant, even one with gas stations, motor bikes and airplanes. It appears he didn't have the right accent for such wealth.

So naïve and humble was he, that he was to be exempted from the first rule of life which is 'Buyer Beware, Caveat Emptor.'

That is a blessed existence. It's a pity Miss Fullerton went to finishing school. But it seems to be to be sheer idleness to judge a case on the merits or demerits of the class origins of the parties involved.

The former Jamaican owners of the failed domestic financial sector did not set out upon these enterprises with criminal intent. It sickens me to see the opposite point of view validated in the courts of the land. Even if it is legal, it cannot be just.