..... Hires U.S Law Firm To Represent Him

PM Mitchell & wife

It's now official.

Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell has accepted a summons from a court in New York where he is expected to appear as a defendant in a one million U.S lawsuit filed against him and jailed fraudster, Eric Resteiner, the former Grenada ambassador.

This latest development comes nearly three weeks after the Grenadian leader refused to accept the court summons from local bailiff, Terry Registe. Documents in the possession of Grenada Today show that Prime Minister Mitchell has retained a top New York law firm to represent him and his wife Marietta Mitchell, who are sued along with Resteiner, sentenced in May to 7 years jail sentence after pleading guilty to multi-million dollar wire and mail fraud.

The firm - Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP is also the same team of lawyers hired to represent Deputy Prime Minister, Gregory Bowen who is facing bribery allegation charges in a New York court by U.S oil tycoon, Jack Grynberg.

Massachussets businessman, Charles Howland is seeking to recover one million dollars in cash that Resteiner is alleged to have paid Prime Minister Mitchell in bribery payment in June 2000 in Switzerland for diplomatic protection. Howland is claiming in his lawsuit that the Grenada Prime Minister benefitted financially from the Resteiner scheme in which he fleeced clients of millions of dollars.

His lawyer, Daniel Abrams informed the court that he had received notification from the Federal Express courier service that it had successfully delivered the summons to Prime Minister Mitchell at his office in the Botanical Gardens in St. George's.

 According to Abrams, the Federal Express confirmation of delivery notice indicated that the court papers were received in Grenada for Prime Minister Mitchell on June 21 by A. Jessamy.

Checks made by GRENADA TODAY reveal that Jessamy is an employee of the Secretariat for the Cabinet of Ministers and is the wife of Michael Jessamy, the former Curator at the Natoinal Museum.

The New York law firm has also written to the judge dealing with the lawsuit involving the Grenada Prime Minister to notify him that the lawyers "have been retained to represent Keith Mitchell and Marietta Mitchell in this action".

The document filed in court on Tuesday said in part that, "....defendants Keith and Marietta Mitchell will move, answer, or otherwise respond to the complaint and amended complaint in this action on or before August 10, 2007". "Further Plaintiff (Charles Howland) and the Mitchell defendants agree that, in the event these defendants move with respect to the amended complaint, plaintiff will have 30 days from the date to respond, and the Mitchell defendants shall have 21 days to reply", Judge Leo Glasser was told.

The letter was signed by Charles Johnson, the same lawyer who made an application in a Boston Court in April on behalf of Minister Bowen for Resteiner not to hand over the briefcase video to Grynberg and urging the fraudster not to  co-operate with the proceedings by taking the Fifth Amendment.

The Switzerland Video-tape is allegedly depicting the handing over of US$500, 000.00 from Resteiner to Prime Minister Mitchell in the form of a bribe to land a diplomatic posting.

The Grenadian leader has admitted receiving "approximately US15, 000.00" from Resteiner at his luxury villa at St. Moritz, Switzerland as reimbursement funds to cover the expenses incurred by his delegation on an investment promotion trip to Europe and Kuwait.