MONROVIA – Five officials of the Central Bank of Liberia (CBL) including the former Governor, Milton Weeks, current Deputy Governor for Operations, Charles Sirleaf Hagba Dorbor, director of banking, Richard H. Walker and Joseph Dennis were found liable of conniving to conceal the true nature of the total and actual amount of Liberian dollar banknotes printed and received by the CBL.
At least three of the five have been arrested and undergoing police investigation with the Liberia National Police.
According to the Presidential Investigation Team’s (PIT) report, the officials of the bank acted criminally by doctoring and fixing reports which were contrary to the actual amounts printed and received by the CBL.
The PIT recommended that they be charged and prosecuted for criminal conspiracy, criminal facilitation, tampering with public records and accounting.
The investigation established that CRANE AB, the company contracted by the CBL in two separate contracts to print banknotes totaling L$15 billion at the cost of US$15,331,689.20 conspired with officials of the CBL to defraud the Government of Liberia by ignoring the terms and conditions of the contract and went ahead to print L$18,151,000,000 in breach of the contract. The Government of Liberia incurred an extra printing cost of US$835,367.78.
The PIT also recommended prosecution for CRANE AB.