PHILIPSBURG--The Joint Court of Justice on Wednesday confirmed the multi-million-dollar criminal forfeiture order against businessman O’Neal Arrindell (44), who is currently serving a forty-month sentence at the Point Blanche prison for fraud and corruption.
In January 2023, the Court of First Instance ordered Arrindell to pay back US $2.33 million in illicit earnings from his involvement in the large-scale “Emerald” fraud case at Port St. Maarten.
The scheme involved forged documents pertaining to “mobilisation costs” and “general conditions” charged to the port on behalf of dredging company Devcon TCI Ltd. Previous court rulings established that the funds were not for services rendered but were disguised payments to Arrindell.
The lower court’s figure in 2023 was calculated by taking the $2.7 million that Arrindell had received in consultancy fees and subtracting the $370,000 that he used to bribe Emerald co-suspect and then-Member of Parliament (MP) Frans Richardson.
As he has before, Arrindell claimed innocence during an appeal hearing earlier this month, telling the court that he had been hired by Devcon and had no idea the foreign company was covering his costs by submitting false invoices to the port.
Defence lawyer Olga Kostrzewski argued that Arrindell had a right to the money because he had done legitimate work under his consultancy contract with Devcon, which included transport and fuel logistics. Additionally, he had been paid in line with standard industry rates, she argued.
The Joint Court bluntly rejected these arguments in Wednesday’s verdict.
“The defence’s arguments on appeal, as well as the requests for additional investigation, are a repetition of the arguments and requests made before the Court of First Instance,” the panel of judges wrote. “These cannot lead to a different judgement [than before – Ed.] and therefore do not require separate or additional legal explanation.”
Arrindell ran out of appeals in the main criminal case in June 2024, when the Dutch Supreme Court confirmed his conviction. However, he still has one appeal remaining in the forfeiture case.
Under the forfeiture order, Arrindell would be forced to spend an additional three years in prison if he fails to repay the seven-figure sum.
Earlier this year, Arrindell’s former lawyer Jairo Bloem told the Joint Court that his client had been trying to reach an out-of-court settlement with the Prosecutor’s Office, but negotiations had not been successful. It emerged around that time that co-suspect Richardson had dropped his appeal in the forfeiture case after agreeing to a payment arrangement with authorities.
