While the US Virgin Islands might be beautiful, they also apparently have a shocking amount of corruption given their size, at least as was revealed in a recent press statement from the Department of Justice (DOJ) about a money laundering scandal involving two top officials in the deeply Democratic territory.
As background, though a territory and not a state, the Virgin Islands does have elected offices, including a delegate to the United States Congress. It tends to vote and be party-affiliated with a deeply, deeply Democratic bent. For example, 12 out of 15 members of the Virgin Islands legislature are members of the Democratic Party.
In any case, the DOJ announced in a press statement that two top officials were involved in a massive bribery and money laundering scandal. It said, “An indictment was unsealed today charging Ray Martinez, the former police commissioner of the Virgin Islands Police Department (VIPD), and Jenifer O’Neal, the former director of the Virgin Islands Office of Management and Budget, with participating in a bribery and money laundering conspiracy. Both defendants made their initial court appearances today in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands.”
Continuing, the statement provided, “According to court documents, Martinez, 56, and O’Neal, 53, both of St. Thomas, accepted bribes from a then-government contractor, David Whitaker. The indictment alleges that the scheme began in at least November 2022 and continued until June 2024, with O’Neal joining the scheme no later than January 2024.”
Getting to the money-laundering aspect of the case, the statement said, “The defendants also allegedly conspired to launder proceeds from the bribery scheme through a monetary transaction to pay rent on O’Neal’s coffee shop. In exchange for the bribes paid by the government contractor, Martinez and O’Neal, among other official acts, allegedly agreed to approve fraudulently inflated invoices and assist with obtaining payment for those invoices by the Virgin Islands to Whitaker.”
Building on that, the statement added, “Martinez also agreed to assist Whitaker in obtaining a $1.48 million contract to provide services to the VIPD in October 2023. Additionally, after the investigation was originally made public, Martinez allegedly obstructed the investigation by encouraging Whitaker to destroy evidence associated with Martinez’s criminal activity and produced falsified documents in response to a subpoena.”
Then describing the massive number of charges the two face, the statement said, “Martinez and O’Neal are each charged with five counts of honest services wire fraud, which each carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison; one count of federal program bribery, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison; and one count of money laundering conspiracy, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. Martinez is also charged with two counts of obstruction of justice, which each carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.”
