Former House Speaker Marisa Dalrymple-Philibert was yesterday fined $900,000 after pleading guilty to breaching the Integrity Commission Act. The parliamentarian found herself in trouble with the law after failing to declare for six years that she had purchased a Mercedes-Benz.
The fine was handed down by Parish Judge Justice Leighton Morris in the Kingston and St Andrew Parish Court yesterday, where Dalrymple-Philibert was also admonished and discharged on four counts of breaching the Parliamentary Act.
The Integrity Commission (IC), in September 2023, had ruled that the Trelawny Southern Member of Parliament (MP) be charged with eight criminal charges for making a false statement in her statutory declaration filings between 2015 and 2021.
2015 Mercedes-Benz
The charges related to breaches of the Parliament (Integrity of Members) Act and the Integrity Commission Act and are connected to the purchase of a 2015 Mercedes-Benz GLA 250, which she omitted from her statutory declarations for six years, and the controversial use of a 20 per cent duty concession to purchase it.
The IC director of investigation found that Dalrymple-Philibert obtained a 20 per cent duty concession in her capacity as an MP to purchase the motor vehicle to be used in connection with her public duties.
The director said given that the vehicle was purchased using the concession due to her, it formed part of her assets and should have been disclosed in her statutory declarations.
However, Dalrymple-Philibert, in a statement, later said that her failure to declare the purchase using a government motor vehicle concession was an oversight.
She said it had escaped her mind to include the information on her filings because the vehicle was primarily used by her sister and her family, and insisted that at no time did she seek to knowingly make a misrepresentation to the IC.
‘Will NOT AFFECT DUTIES’
Attorney-at-law Peter Champagnie, KC, who represented the politician, explained in a statement yesterday that his client decided not to contest some of the charges, given that she had already filed updated statements for the motor vehicle.
“The decision to offer no contest to the charges was heavily influenced by the reasoning of the parish judge at the time of rejecting the preliminary point,” he said.
“One of the things the court noted was that the act itself did not have a provision which clearly allowed the commission itself discretion to give Mrs Dalrymple-Philibert the benefit of correcting record and avoiding the necessity of going through to the court.”
Champagnie further said “all of the offences for which Mrs Dalrymple-Philibert was before the court are non-recordable offences and would not in any way adversely affect her parliamentary duties.”
“The position taken by my client was a noble one, especially in light of the fact that a preliminary point had been taken and certain area in terms of the act itself was discussed by the parish judge and in all of the circumstances was the best course to take,” he said.
Champagnie took the opportunity to urge lawmakers to reconsider the provisions of the Integrity Commission Act, to allow parliamentarians and other public officials the chance to make corrections to prior statutory declarations during an inquiry, without the need for court proceedings.
He emphasised that these matters are “largely administrative and should not unduly burden the court system”.
Dalrymple-Philibert had resigned as MP and House Speaker on September 21, 2023, over the matter.
However, she was re-elected to represent Trelawny Southern in a by-election on November 22 last year and resumed sitting in the House of Representatives in December.
