DVDL employee sent to jail over driver’s license scam

(CMR) Kimberley Elizabeth Roberts (Riley) aged 35 was sentenced to 9 months and 2 weeks imprisonment in Grand Court today after pleading guilty in April to breach of trust and conspiracy to commit a breach of trust contrary to sections 13 and 52 of the Anti-Corruption Law (2016 revision).

Riley was charged over a year ago in the 3-year-old investigation at that time. She was originally arrested in October 2017 along with 3 others.

Her co-accused Alex Rattay received a sentence of 13 months imprisonment suspended for 24 months along 240 hours community Service Order over 1 year, for the one offense.

The Anti-Corruption Commission noted that the convictions follow a complex and protracted investigation by ACC investigators into allegations of widespread abuse of the issuance of drivers’ licenses by a former member of the Department of Vehicle and Drivers’ Licensing (DVDL).

The duo was accused of running a scam through the Department of Vehicle and Drivers’ Licensing (DVDL) where Roberts worked issuing driver's licenses to persons who had not completed the legal requirements to obtain a license.

She was accused of taking money from customers of DVDL for both the written and driving exams and lodging it in the system. The person would then pay her a separate fee to record the transactions which on the face of it showed the person had completed those requirements. However, upon further investigation, there were no test results in the system because they had never actually taken the exams. She was paid a fee by the parties for these fraudulent transactions.

The issuance of the licenses meant that a number of them had to be recalled.

During the course of the investigation the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) was assisted by members of the DVDL, Cayman Islands Government Internal Audit Department and the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service.

The offenses committed by these individuals were of a particularly serious nature, not only due to the abuse of the public trust, but also because they posed a significant risk to public safety by facilitating unlicensed and, in many cases, untrained persons to drive on the public roads, together with the additional hazard of being uninsured.