More accusations are levelled at Webb in ongoing trial of Canover Watson
GEORGE TOWN: More evidence about the financial scams being run by Jeffrey Webb, disgraced ex-FIFA vice-president, have emerged over the past week in the continuing trial of business associate Canover Watson.
The accused, a former member of the FIFA audit committee entrusted with keeping a close watch on the world federation’s finances, has denied corruption charges concerning a CarePay hospital payments system.
The prosecution has claimed that Watson created a secondary operating company through which public money was diverted in a string of other personal and business accounts and companies. Webb and Jack Warner, his predecessor as CONCACAF president, both benefited from the scam.
Webb is currently on bail to house arrest in the United States over corruption charges to which he has admitted in the FIFAGate investigation; Warner is contesting extradition from Trinidad and Tobago over similar charges.
Watson, former chairman of the Health Services Authority Board, accepted under cross-examination that he helped Webb create false documents to send cash to a US bank but denied helping him launder money.
The evidence was discovered within Watson’s computers and flash drives.
Watson accepted that he had been party to the creation of a false employment contract for Webb that showed him working at AIS Cayman Ltd from 2008, more than two years before the firm which won the lucrative hospital contract was formed, earning a salary of $15,000 per month.
The false contract had also indicated that Webb received a bonus of more than $300,000. That contract was used by Webb as security with Wells Fargo towards the mortgage of the home in Atlanta to which he is currently restricted.
The prosecution has claimed the purchase, effectively, was financed by money siphoned from public funds via AIS Cayman Ltd and other bribes and kickbacks to both Webb and to Watson.
Evidence from Watson suggested that Webb would attend his office and use his computer to create and save documents in Watson’s folders and flash drives. Webb would then ask Watson to send them to him or other people.
Money was moved through accounts and companies including Black Holdings Ltd, which had been owned by Peter Campbell, a friend of both Watson and Webb and then vice-president of the Cayman Islands Football Association.
Another beneficial company was JD International, the firm controlled jointly by Webb and Warner.
Watson has insisted throughout that almost everything of which he was accused had been at the direction of Webb. He had been too busy with the CarePay scheme to keep a close eye on what was being undertaken in his name.
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