Monrovia – Criminal Court ‘A’ Judge Roosevelt Z. Willie has denied report of subpoenaing the Lonestar Cell MTN for the call log of the secretary of the Liberian Senate J. Nanborlor F. Singbeh.
Judge Willie said the subpoena that ordered the Lonestar Cell MTN to release the call log of defendant Singbeh was issued without his consent, approval and knowledge.
“There are processes that are carried on to obtain a subpoena for the various GSM companies and the various banks. If any security agency (Police, Immigration, NSA among others) is conducting an investigation on a suspicious telephone number(s) that have been used covertly, they will write the County Attorney of Montserrado County, the County Attorney will do a petition and attach it on their (security agency) request and send it to Criminal Court ‘A’ Judge to subpoena the number(s) that are been investigated from the GSM company, Lonestar or Orange.”
He adds: ” When that petition is sent to me and I look through it and conduct an interview with them (security agency), if I am satisfied, I authorize my clerk to issue the subpoena to said GSM company to forward that number(s) call log and then we send it to the investigating security agency.”
However, Judge Willie added that internal investigation conducted revealed that two of his court staffers, Enoch W. Brooks, Assistant Clerk and Thomas Garlo, Deputy Clerk are responsible for issuing the subpoena on the Lonestar Cell for the call log of defendant Singbeh.
“There is no file, there is nothing that I approved to authorize (them) to subpoena the call log of Nanborlor Singbeh. Every request or subpoena from the County Attorney has communication in it, and that communication is approved by me before I send it to them (Clerks). So, if there is no record than I will assume that they did it on their own.”
Judge continued: “We’ve been investigating it and finally Enoch W. Brooks, Assistant Clerk gave me an email where it is stated that he ordered this call log from Lonestar GSM Company.”
Judge Willie statement is a clarification to an article written in the Heritage Newspaper on November 24, 2020 captioned: “Senate Secretary Singbeh Complains Judge Willie of Unethical Behavior -Writes Chief Justice Korkpor.”
In the article, according to Secretary Singbeh, cell no. 0886511308 belonging to him (Singbeh) call log were subpoena without his knowledge and consent and given to one Hans Armstrong for publication in local dailies.
“Your honor, it is important to note that at no time that I have had matter pending before the Criminal Court ‘A’ or being under investigation by said court for the period slated in the Writ of Subpoena Dece Tecum, urgent! That might have predicated the issuance of said writ on the management of Lonestar Cell GSM Company to produce my call log and other information without my knowledge and consent coupled with presenting said instruments by Judge Willie to one Hans Armstrong for publication in local dailies,” the article quoted Secretary Singbeh.
However, Judge Willie said the report is false, misleading and does not represent the facts of the matter.
“There was a report carried in the Heritage Newspaper concerning me, that headline was not being reported the way it should have been reported because they (Heritage Newspaper) didn’t get the facts, they didn’t do professional journalism to contact the other party, who is me”
He continued: “I have worked with the Judiciary for almost 15 years, one day my name has never appeared in any shady deals or unethical acts.”
Judge Willie added that he is writing a formal communication to Chief Justice Francis S. Korkpor over the “unethical behavior” of his two staffers who are responsible for the act.
Meanwhile, Judge Willie has written the two GSM companies, Lonestar Cell MTN and Orange Liberia not to send call logs information to personal email(s).
Judge Willie has also issued a writ of arrest for police Superintendent Raffel A. Wilson and Hans Armstrong for their failure to follow the legal procedural in obtaining a subpoena from the court.
However, Enoch W. Brooks, Assistant Clerk told FrontPageAfrica in an interview that the subpoena was prayed for by Montserrado County Attorney Edwin Klar Martin to be issued on the Lonestar Cell Company.
“It can be recalled sometime in May, specifically May 6, the police, during their investigation which is our (Criminal Court ‘A’) normal thing, requested a subpoena from the County Attorney to pray the court, so, that subpoena was being prayed for. I was not in office and then my deputy (Thomas Garlo) received the subpoena, signed for it and gave a copy to the office of the County Attorney for documentation purpose.”
Brooks added: “That subpoena was turned over to me on my desk when I came to work. The main content was to be issued to Lonestar for its sole purpose which is to pull out the call log of whosoever that was a person of interest to the police investigation.”
However, Brooks acknowledged that the subpoena was not authorized and approved by Judge Willie to be issued on the Lonestar Cell.
“We don’t normally engage the Judge (Willie) specifically on the issue of call log, let that be clear, because of the influx of call log that comes in on a daily basis. Sometimes, he (Judge Willie) is in court, sometimes he is busy, sometimes he is in conference so when the call log comes, we issue it base on the urgency of the investigation,” Clerk Brooks added.
“Every precept coming out of a court, to authenticate its legitimacy, carries the Judge name because if you don’t put the Judge name, the question will be ” Who was the judge in chamber when the document was issued?”
Clerk Brooks further stated: “So, on that theme, every precept from the court will carry Judge Willie name whether he is in the know or not because is during his term of court. That whole document that I sent to Lonestar, there is no directive from Judge Willie in that document because that is our normal system.”
However, Thomas Garlo, Deputy Clerk, who is also linked to the allegation of facilitating Assistant Clerk Brooks to subpoena the call log of Secretary Singbeh from the Lonestar Cell MTN declined to comment on the issue.
However, the subpoenaed call log has been used by prosecution to recuse Judge Blamo Dixon of Criminal Court ‘C’ from presiding over defendant Singbeh alleged USD$5m corruption case.
In the motion titled: “Motion For Recusal”, filed on November 20, 2020, based on the call log in the case: Republic of Liberia by and thru Hans Armstrong V.S Nanborlor Singbeh, Secretary of the Liberian Senate, prosecution alleged that Judge Dixon had on multiple occasion been in communication with Defendant Singbeh and Champman Logan, one of the defendants in the case, which prosecution says undermines fair play and transparent justice.
Singbeh was taken to the court (Criminal Court ‘C’) in February 2020 by Hans Armstrong, a British investor and Attorney-In-Fact for the 70% (seventy percent) majority shareholder, Pavel and Martin Miloschewsky, two brothers who served as managers for a Czech Republic company, MHM Eko-Liberia Limited, accused Singbeh of allegedly ” stealing” USD$5m from the Czech company.