SUMMARY
- Bernhard Ten Brinke, who is also an international rally driver, says the money belongs to him having wired the amount to a lawyer who was involved in the transaction.
- In April, the High Court froze several accounts in two banks following an application by the Assets Recovery Agency, saying the owners were involved in a money-laundering scheme.
A Dutch investor who lost more than Sh171 million to a suspected gold fraudster in Nairobi has sought to join a case before the High Court saying millions frozen by a state agency belong to him.
Bernhard Ten Brinke, who is also an international rally driver, says the money belongs to him having wired the amount to a lawyer who was involved in the transaction sometime in January this year, for the purchase of 500kg of gold but the consignment was not delivered to him.
In April, the High Court froze several accounts in two banks following an application by the Assets Recovery Agency, saying the owners were involved in a money-laundering scheme.
The accounts frozen belong to Mubadala Merchants Limited, First Cargo Logistics Limited, First Line Capital Limited, and Doumbe Malonga Eddy Michel and are held in Standard Chartered Bank and Cooperative Bank.
Mr Brinke says he entered into a contract to purchase 500kg of gold with a man called George Fundu, through Global Freight Management Ltd.
He said Elvis Ouma Muga alias Nick Muganda accompanied by his representative visited a gold smelting premises and witnessed 50kg of gold being processed.
His representative- Ewuot Haanstra allegedly paid $1,567,120 into an escrow account opened by Ochieng Opiyo Advocates for payment of 450kg of gold, but Mr Muga failed to deliver the precious metal. Mr Muga has since been charged with conspiracy to defraud, by pretending that he and others were involved in a genuine business of selling gold. This was after Mr Haanstra made a complaint to the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI).
Mr Brinke says that in the deal, the parties agreed to open an escrow account for the gold transaction through Ochieng’ Opiyo & Company Advocates. He says the law firm was not to release the money until he got instructions from him.
He said he transferred by SWIFT$ 1,567,160 (about Sh171 million) from his account in the Netherlands on January 11, to the account opened by Mr Opiyo at Sidian Bank to facilitate the payments of the consignment. But he was shocked to learn that the monies were transferred to several accounts without his instructions, to deprive him of the money.
He said Mr Opiyo made a false declaration to the bank that the money in the account was for purposes of carrying out a timber export business by a company belonging to Brinke.
“Upon the crediting of the monies by Sidian Bank, Alfred Ochieng’ Opiyo then immediately commenced an elaborate scheme to quickly move the monies out of the account into numerous accounts,” he said in an affidavit.
He said from the six accounts frozen, Mr Opiyo carried out several transactions that supported the false invoices and declarations.
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