Another former Grenadian diplomat indicted
by Leroy Noel
Thursday, May 20, 2004
ST GEORGE‘S, Grenada: Two former Grenadian
diplomats have now been indicted in the United States in relation to financial
scandals. German national Eric Resteiner has become the second former diplomat
of scandal-plagued Grenada in six months to be criminally indicted in the US.
Resteiner, once a General Ambassador for Grenada, was indicted on 33 counts of
wire fraud, 9 counts of mail fraud, and 18 counts of money laundering at the
US District Court for the District of Massachusetts on March 24, 2004.
According to press reports he has been in custody in Singapore since February
of this year, and it is believed that the United States will seek his
extradition. Resteiner, of Lyford Cay, in the Bahamas, and St Moritz, in
Switzerland, is alleged to have defrauded 50 investors out of more than $30
million in a high-yield investment scam. As
reported in Offshore Alert newsletter last month, the St Moritz villa was
where Resteiner allegedly paid US$500,000 in cash to Grenada's Prime Minister
Keith Mitchell on June 25, 2000 which was said to be partial payment for his
appointment as an Ambassador, according to Resteiner's former Director of
Security, Timothy Bass. Mitchell has admitted
receiving cash from Resteiner at the meeting but he claims it was between
US$12,000 and US$14,000 and was not a personal pay-off but was to cover the
expenses of a Grenada delegation during a trip to promote the country.
The Offshore Alert article has been followed up by several media
organizations, including BBC World Service and the Associated Press, and led
to Mitchell's government issuing a press release on May 10, 2004 denying the
allegation. Mitchell's government has been
plagued by allegations of corruption. Most or all of the more than 40 offshore
banks that were licensed in Grenada since 1997 have collapsed, with most of
them involved in overtly fraudulent activity which caused losses to foreign
investors totaling hundreds of millions of dollars.
Resteiner's indictment comes less than six months after another Grenada
diplomat, Viktor Kozeny, was indicted in Manhattan on charges that he stole
$182 million from 15 New York-based investment funds.
Like Resteiner, Kozeny, who was born in the former Czechoslovakia, obtained a
Grenada passport under its now-defunct economic citizenship program.
Back...
Most popular
articles: viewed, printed and e-mailed
Printable
version
| 
