-usw^caribbeantodj..c.


CARIBBEAN TODAY


n e wS


April 2008


Canada says no to Caribbean

immigration application cap


MIAMI Police last month
arrested an influential Haitian
American community activist
here and charged him with
more than 20 counts of racket-
eering, theft and money laun-
dering.
 Ringo Cayard, 55, direc-
tor of the Miami-based
Haitian American Foundation
Inc. (HAFI), was arrested on
the night of Mar. 20 on the
charges, which include fake
records which he used to give
himself a significant bonus.
 Police also charged
Cayard with siphoning thou-
sands of dollars from Miami-
Dade County contracts relat-
ed to staging festivals and pro-
viding meals to the elderly
and that his arrest caps
,\pi npg investigation" of
the foundation's finances over


the past two
and a half
years.
 HAFI,
one of the
best-known
social services
agencies in
Miami-Dade's Card
Haitian com-
munity,
received almost $2.9 million in
county contracts and grants
between 2002 and 2006.

PROMINENT
 Cayard has been one of
the most prominent voices in
local Haitian politics over the
past 25 years. He's been a
political ally to Miami Mayor
Manny Diaz and County
Commissioner Dorrin Rolle.
Diaz placed Cayard on a city


bond-oversight board.
 "To arrest him under
cover of darkness on the eve
of Holy Week is a disgrace,"
said Milton Hirsch, Cayard's
lawyer.
 The arrest report also said
Cayard r,. i, ri, d a
scheme to bill the county for
phantom mnal, that HAFI
was supposed to deliver to eld-
erly Haitian residents under a
contract with the county's
Alliance for Human Services.
 The report charged that
Cayard and a HAFI employee
submitted fake monthly
invoices six times between
April 2003 and Jan. 2005
when his non-profit failed to
deliver any meals.
0


Jamaican acquitted of shooting at N.Y. cops


NEW YORK A jury in New
York has acquitted a Jamaican
man who was the first person
charged under a new law in
2006 that increased prison sen-
tences for the attempted mur-
der of a police officer.
 The jury in State Supreme
Court in Brooklyn last month
found Damien Henry not guilty
in a case in which he was
charged with firing an Uzi auto-
matic machine gun at two police
officers outside a Jamaican
nightclub in the East Flatbush
section of Brooklyn in 2004.
 Henry, 27, was shot 18
times by the officers but sur-
vived. The officers were unin-
jured.
 Several jurors said they
believed that the officers were


less than completely honest on
the witness stand.
 "There were a lot of holes
in the case," said one juror, a
woman in her 20s.
 "I felt like they weren't
always telling the whole truth,"
she added.

IN PRISON
 Henry is celebrating his
acquittals in prison, where he is
serving a 25-year sentence for
shooting up a Brooklyn restau-
rant in 2005 after being told to
smoke outside.
 Henry, who had faced a
possible life sentence for the
attempted murder of two
police officers and two bounc-
ers in the current case, was
convicted on Mar. 5 of second-


Guyanese-born U.S...


(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2)
application was approved, she
could not visit her parents or
her brothers' graves and then
legally re-enter the U.S., they
said. And if her application
was denied, she would face
deportation.

PATTERN
 The charges against
Baichu, who became a U.S.
citizen in 1991 and earns
roughly $50,000 a year, appear
to be part of a larger pattern,
according to government
records. A Miami agent of
Immigration and Customs
Enforcement, responsible for
transporting a Haitian woman
to detention, is awaiting trial
on charges that he took her to
his home and raped her.
 "Despite our best efforts
there are always people ready
to use their position for per-
sonal gain or personal pleas-


ure," said Chris Bentley, a
spokesman for Citizenship
and Immigration Services.
 "Our responsibility is to
ferret them out," he added.
 According to the criminal
complaint, Baichu told the
Colombian woman he expect-
ed her to do "just like the last
time," and offered to take her
to a garage or the bathroom
of a friend's real estate busi-
ness so she would be "more
comfortable doing it" there.
 Prosecutors said Baichu
was arrested as he emerged
from a Queens diner and
headed to his car.
 Later released on $15,000
bail, Baichu referred calls for
comment to his lawyer, Sally
Attia.
 She said Baichu "did not
have authority to grant or
deny green card petitions with-
out his supervisor's approval."
0


degree weapons possession,
which carries a sentence of
three to 15 years.
 In 2002, Henry was charged
with shooting an officer in the
arm, but was acquitted.
 In 2004, he intervened in
an arrest and was charged with
punching an officer, Andrew
Rydlewski, in the face. He
pleaded guilty to a low-level
misdemeanor.
 It was 10 days after his
plea in the punching case that
Henry got into another con-
frontation with Rydlewski out-
side the Ragtop Lounge in
East Flatbush after being
denied entry. Rydlewski and
Sergeant Ajay Kapour said
that Henry fired an Uzi at
them, and they shot back, strik-
ing him 18 times without hit-
ting any major organs.

NEW LAW
 Henry was charged under a
new law that increased the mini-
mum sentence for attempted
murder of a police officer to 20
years, from 15. Henry's lawyer,
Harold C. Baker, mounted a
defense that his client was "set
up" by the police and bouncers.
The bouncers had summoned the
officers with calls to their private
cellular telephones, not to 911.
 Several jurors said that
while they did not believe the
conspiracy theory, they were
troubled by testimony by a
police expert in gunshot
residue that several of the
shots that struck Henry were
fired from less than eight inch-
es away. The officers had testi-
fied that they shot him from
about 10 feet away.
 "Some of the jurors really
had a bad perception of the
cops, and they didn't believe
them," said the jury fore-
woman, Khadijah Carter.
0


TORONTO, Canada -
Citizenship and Immigration
Minister Diane Finley has
promised that the number of
applicants seeking to enter
Canada yearly from the
Caribbean and the rest of the
world will not be capped and
family re-unification will be
preserved in the legislative
amendments to modernize the
immigration system.
 She addressed the con-
cerns with CMC a week after
the Conservative government
tabled sweeping immigration
legislation to clear up the huge
backlog of applicants and
bring in skilled workers more
quickly. The backlog stands at
about 800,000, and some appli-
cants have been waiting for
almost six years to have their
applications looked at.
 "That's totally unaccept-
able," declared Finley. "We
are competing with other
countries that have processing
times of three to six months
and we are six years. We are
competing with other coun-
tries for talent that we very
much need right across the
country. We are losing out in
the competitiveness race.
 "The changes that we are
making are really about bring-
ing common sense and good
business and management
practices to the immigration


system. Under the existing
system, every application has
to be processed, even if an
applicant has made multiple
applications, a person is dead
or someone chooses to go to
another country.
 "The changes have noth-
ing to do with the refugee
system, there are no caps on
the number of applications
and the preservation of family
re-unification is a priority for
us because we care about
family."

SWAP
 To expedite the process
quickly and smoothly, Finley
said consideration will be
given to transferring applica-
tions from a country or region
swamped with requests to
enter to Canada to another
country or area where the
workload is not hectic.
 Finley also said adminis-
trative changes will be made
and the ministry's computer
system will be upgraded to
fast-track the process in three
to six months.
 In its last budget, the gov-
ernment set aside $22 million
over the next two years and
$37 million a year after that
for additional resources to
shorten wait times and reduce
the backlog.
0


 Regional leaders hold


'fruitful' talks with Bush


WASHINGTON Three
Caribbean leaders emerged
from talks with United States
President George W. Bush last
month, describing their con-
sultations as fruitful.
 Prime ministers Hubert
Ingraham of The Bahamas,
David Thompson of Barbados
and Dean Barrow of Belize
gave no indication of what their
discussions would yield, but
reported that issues of democ-
racy, security, tourism and the
Caribbean Basin Initiative were
among the topics discussed with
the American leader.
 "We had a discussion like
you would expect neighbors to
have," President Bush told
members of the media after
the meeting.
 "We talked about trade and
tourism. We talked about how
to make sure that our security
needs are met without inter-
rupting the ability for our peo-
ple to travel as freely as possible
and for the ability of people to
be able to make a good living as
a result of tourism."

ASSURANCE
 The U.S. leader also gave


the Caribbean heads the
assurance that their region
was important to his country.
 "We often times talk
about dealing with the Middle
East or dealing on the conti-
nent of Africa, but it was
important for these leaders to
know that we believe that a
good, strong, healthy, vibrant
neighborhood is in the inter-
ests of the United States,"
Bush said. "So we had a good,
friendly, important discussion,
and I can't thank the leaders
enough for coming."
 Referring to the recent
election victories of prime
ministers Thompson and
Barrow, Bush commended
Barbados and Belize for their
g Id, fair, clean elections."
 Ingraham, who is also
CARICOM's chairman,
thanked the president on
behalf of the leaders for tak-
ing time out to discuss the
matters.
 "We're very pleased and
grateful that the U.S. presi-
dent invited us to come," he
said.
0


Haitian activist arrested on theft,

 racketeering charges in Miami