It's up to the Jury now Jack, "what will it be" ?
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B.C. Securities Commission (C-*BCSC) - Street Wire.
BCSC-known Purdy faces wait for his fate with Miami jury
B.C. Securities Commission *BCSC
Friday February 28 2003 Street Wire.
by Stockwatch Miami correspondent
The fate of John (Jack) Purdy's future is now solely in the hands of a Miami jury. The veteran Vancouver penny stock promoter's speedy eight-day money laundering trial is now all but over, with the only thing left either a verdict of guilty or acquittal. The U.S. government claims Mr. Purdy agreed in a conspiracy to launder $25-million of drug money a year, while the defence claims he was an innocent and honourable victim unfairly targeted and snared by undercover federal agents in a sting. (All figures are in U.S. dollars.)
Mr. Purdy was arrested Aug. 14, 2002, as one of 20 Canadians in a two-year joint RCMP-FBI undercover sting called Operation Bermuda Short that netted 60 defendants. Mr. Purdy and Vancouver associate Martin Chambers, a reputed Hells Angels associate facing a separate trial later, were among the top targets in the money laundering arm of the Bermuda Short sting. (Most of the defendants were indicted and arrested in a sting conspiracy to bribed a dirty fund manager.)
The pressure was on for federal prosecutor Richard Hong and defence counsel Neal Sonnett to make a convincing case Thursday in their brief closing arguments. Judge Moore originally said he would give each side just 20 minutes for closing, but after Mr. Sonnett argued this was totally insufficient, and he needed at least an hour, the judge relented and gave 30 minutes.
Prosecutor Mr. Hong told the jury they had the evidence, the law and their own common sense on their side to determine that Mr. Purdy is guilty of money laundering in the sting conspiracy.
Defence attorney Mr. Sonnett countered that his client was the victim of overzealous law enforcement, entrapment and the ulterior motives of his former partners and co-conspirators.
"You sit between an overzealous government and the people that are unfairly prosecuted on insufficient evidence," Mr. Sonnett told jurors in his closing statement. "For four years we know the undercover agents were acting like a pack of wolves, trying to get my client. But they couldn't do it."
Mr. Hong responded that Mr. Purdy was well aware of the dealings of his underlings, despite his later attempts to wash his hands of the money laundering schemes.
"When he was told this is cocaine money, it doesn't stick? When he's told, 'This is drug money, I'm scared,' it doesn't stick? This is an intelligent man," Mr. Hong told the court, staring at Mr. Purdy. "Don't insult us!"
Before the closing arguments, Mr. Sonnett did not call any defense witnesses once the prosecution rested its case.
Instead, he played a tape recording made of his client by the undercover agents just before his arrest in which Mr. Purdy says he does not want to have further dealings with the agents who were posing as members of the Colombian Cali cocaine cartel.
"I hope you can get this clear, clear, clear. I will not commit at this time. I'm not going to commit. I don't want to be lured further into it," Mr. Purdy is heard telling the RCMP undercover agent known as Bill McDonald on the tape, just two days before he was arrested in New York.
Mr. Purdy also made other statements about not knowing what his partner Kevan Garner was up to when he received $500,000 in cash from the undercover agents and tried to launder it through a shell company called American Toy Vending.
Mr. Garner, who pled guilty as a co-defendant in the case, previously testified that he had kept Mr. Purdy informed about all the transactions, but acknowledged that no physical record exists of those conversations.
"In most cases, the tapes are the government's best friend, but in this case they also show that my client was not involved," said Mr. Sonnett, dismissing Mr. Garner as "one of the slickest people I've ever seen on the witness stand."
For a conspiracy to have taken place, Mr. Sonnett argued, there must have been a meeting of the minds between the co-defendants.
Mr. Sonnett argued that no such meeting of the minds took place. "There was no meeting of the minds between Jack Purdy and Kevan Garner. The $500,000 was done by Kevan Garner alone ... we know from the tapes that Kevan Garner never talked to Jack Purdy about the $500,000, we know he never told Jack Purdy about American Toy, and we know that he didn't tell Jack Purdy about Martin Chambers," Mr. Sonnett said.
"When does Jack Purdy find out about all this? When a goon showed up at his office," said Mr. Sonnett, referring to an enforcer sent by the undercover agents to the shared offices of Mr. Purdy and Mr. Garner, when the 60-day period for flipping the purported cocaine money lapsed.
The prosecution argued that Mr. Purdy knew what was going on all along, harkening back to the six-hour video tape of a February, 2002, meeting between Mr. Purdy and undercover agents aboard a luxury yacht in Fort Lauderdale.
"He goes down to the boat, and Ricardo says 'this is cocaine money,'" Mr. Hong said, recounting the early testimony of the undercover agent. "It couldn't be more black and white, more in-your-face."
"Agent (Ricardo) Pagan testified that he couldn't have been more clear that it was cocaine money unless he actually showed him a brick of white powder," the prosecutor told the jury.
Mr. Garner's motivation for testifying was called into question by Mr. Sonnett, as it was on Wednesday, when Mr. Garner was on the witness stand.
Mr. Sonnett had suggested that Mr. Garner was testifying against his former partner in hopes of getting a reduced prison sentence.
"You have to consider whether Kevan Garner has a motive to lie, saying 'I spoke to Jack Purdy,' when there is nothing on the tapes to show that," Mr. Sonnett said.
"The bottom line is that Kevan Garner was doing it on his own. He was cheating Jack Purdy and he was cheating the undercover agents."
Prosecutor Mr. Hong conceded that Mr. Garner was an undesirable character, but argued that his testimony was still truthful.
"He's a fraud, and he's a criminal," Mr. Hong said about Mr. Garner. "One thing the defense has not shown is that he's a liar. All the things he said meshed with documents and the evidence."
Mr. Sonnett also blasted the government case for not calling as a witness the RCMP undercover agent who called himself Mr. McDonald.
"I suggest that prosecution didn't want me to cross examine him," Mr. Sonnett said, speculating that McDonald might have confirmed that Mr. Purdy was not interested in taking cash. "I could have called Bill McDonald, I know where he works. But that's not my job. I don't have to prove anything," Mr. Sonnett said, emphasizing the government's burden of proof.
(Mr. Sonnett did not call a single witness, either to support his client Mr. Purdy or to attempt to trash the government's case.)
Mr. Hong replied that if Mr. Sonnett wanted to call Mr. McDonald, he could have subpoenaed him as a defense witness. As far as Mr. Hong was concerned, the undercover agent's role in the transcripts and tapes was enough.
"That's a red herring," Mr. Hong said. "Not an issue."
Defence lawyer Mr. Sonnett appealed to the jury to acquit his client.
"You don't have to like Jack Purdy," Mr. Sonnett told them. "Frankly, not a lot of people do, he's brash and he talks a lot ... but that doesn't make him a criminal."
The jurors continue deliberations Friday.
bmudry@stockwatch.com
(c) Copyright 2003 Canjex Publishing Ltd.
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