The hearing of evidences on the million dollar fraud case of the former permanent secretary for the Ministry of Infrastructure Development (MID) Henry Murray and his wife Rose will continue today.
This was after no hearing was conducted yesterday to allow prosecution to obtain documents from the bank and sort out documents for the court exhibits.
Chief Magistrate Emma Garo therefore adjourned the matter to today for prosecution to call its second witness.
Prosecution’s first witness, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Communication and Aviation, Moses Virivolomo had already completed his evidence on Friday last week.
Prosecution has 42 witnesses to call in the month-long trial.
Henry is facing 14 counts of official corruption while his wife faces 16 counts of false pretence for allegedly defrauding the government of more than $1million between April 2014 and April 2017.
They were both arrested by the anti-corruption task force JANUS.
The Murrays were charged in relation to a company they allegedly set up in 2014, when Murray was employed as the Director of Mechanical Engineering Division which received $1,151,850 of public funds by Murray.
Murray was then appointed as Permanent Secretary on 31 August 2015 when he allegedly signed the agreement of Service as PS of MID with the Solomon Islands.
Prosecution alleged they registered the Krash Transport & Marketing as a business with the Company Haus on 11 February 2014.
They then allegedly opened an ANZ bank account to which they were both signatories.
It was alleged that on 15 August 2014, the defendant and his wife registered the business entity Krash Transport and Marketing with the Inland Revenue Division (IRD) of the Ministry of Finance & Treasury (MoFT) for tax purposes.
Between April 2014 and May 2017, it was alleged Krash Transport and Marketing have entered into agreements with the Ministry of Infrastructure Development.
These agreements as alleged have been for the hire of motor vehicles for personnel of the Ministry of Infrastructure Development, including the Permanent Secretary Murray himself.
Police alleged that the Ministry of Finance and Treasury, through the Ministry of Infrastructure Development, has made of more than $1million Krash Transport and Marketing for motor vehicle hires.
These payments, which were allegedly made through cheques and electronic funds transfers, were deposited into their ANZ account in the name of Krash Transport and Marketing.
The L & L Lawyers is representing Murray and his wife while Public Prosecutor Florence Joel is appearing for the Crown.
By ASSUMPTA BUCHANAN
