“Integrity Issues within Taxand” A POSITION PAPER BY: Peter E. Muller

Recent Updates can be found at the bottom of this post!

UPDATED April 2024

“Integrity Issues within  Taxand”

A POSITION PAPER BY:

Peter E. Muller

April 2012 – April 2024

Introduction:

This position paper describes the situation that has arisen in the Taxand Curacao BV office resulting from the apparent (financial) mismanagement of one of its partners and the cover-up by the Supervisory Board of Taxand Curacao BV and the Taxand Global Board. Our findings are all fact-based as we could among others rely on information that was put on our server by the fraudulent partner, Mrs. Judith Brewster.

Taxand  Curacao BV shareholders are:

VMW Taxand Netherlands; delivered its Supervisory Board (SB) Director Mr. Roelof Vos. This firm had to end its activities due to the megalomania of Mr. Vos.

Taxand Venezuela: through a Curacao private foundation, delivered its SB Director Manuel Candal (a member of the Taxand Global Board himself) . www.taxand.com.ve., we are not sure if this Private Foundation has been set in place for the benefit of Mr. Candal solely or for all the Taxand Venezuela partners.

Muller & Associates: owned by Peter Muller, Managing Director
www.linkedin.com/in/petermullercuracao

B & B Consultancy: owned by Mrs. Brewster, Managing Director.

The origins of the financial misconduct rises from the St. Maarten Tax Reform Project (with a value of US$ 11.000.000,- its first year alone). A project that was jointly executed by three Taxand member firms;

Alvarez & Marsal Taxand UK ( A&M Taxand ): represented by Mr. Richard Baxter and Mr. Stephen Machin;

VMW Taxand The Netherlands / Taxand Nederland : represented by Mr. Roelof Vos;

Taxand Curacao: represented by Mrs. Judith Brewster & Mr. Peter Muller (the latter until June 1st, 2012).

The whole idea of writing this blog stems from our decision to have the fraud of all involved not slide by but to fight back. We knew that a lot would happen and we thought that it would make sense to start reporting events already happened and yet to come.

It was much later that we decided to have our writings evolve into this blog. The purpose of this blog is to expose the persons involved in the fraud committed and exposure of those who facilitated or collaborated on defrauding us.

Background; Facts and Circumstances:

My name is Peter Muller (PM) and I am a Curacao based tax lawyer (Masters Degree in tax law from the State University Groningen, Netherlands, 1993).

Please find my Resume @: www.linkedin.com/in/petermullercuracao

And this is a picture of my beautiful wife and me:

During the course of 2010 I was invited to join the Taxand ( www.taxand.com ) worldwide network (founded by former Arthur Andersen partners headed by French peer Frederic Donnedieu de Vabres.)

at its reign), which I did while merging with a similar local tax firm B & B Consultancy (belonging to Mrs. Judith Brewster) to create an instant substantial Tax practice which opened its offices on January 1st, 2011.

The fact that Mrs. Judith Brewster (JB) and her late husband were personal friends of mine since 1995, and that she claimed to have the same educational background as me (Masters in Tax Law Degree) were reasons why I approached JB in 2010 to join me in the Taxand Curacao organization. JB also claimed to be trained as an accountant on a Bachelors’ level so this is why it was an obvious choice for her to become responsible for Taxand Curacao’s financials; meaning that all day to day financial management was executed by her.

It started off nicely enough:

Extravagant lifestyle of Taxand Curaçao Partner: Judith Brewster
When JB moved into our office building in October 2010, my wife, our office manager and I did notice that JB lived a lavish lifestyle. She had mentioned to us, that she was lucky that her late husband –whom according to her died of a heart attack in 2007- had left her well off with a substantial amount in life insurance. She even mentioned that she was “worth” ANG. 1,800.000.-.

So the fact that she was building an ANG 900.000.00 (US$ 515.000.00) villa in an upscale resort, and the order of a new Audi Q5 of ANG. 105.000.- (US$ 57.000.00) did not appear strange to us.

JB and her daughters also spent many week-ends in 4 and 5 star hotels on the Island. Daily breakfasts, lunches and dinners were enjoyed in good restaurants and the kids were showered with the best and newest cell phones, I-pads etc. No money was spared on their personal grooming either; on our server we later found out that the day before she left to attend the Taxand Global Conference in Madrid, Spain on April 23rd, 2012, the three of them went on a shopping spree which set her back (or maybe we should say Taxand) around ANG 8,000.00 (US. 4,500.00) that day alone on clothing, a hairdresser & jewelry.

It seemed to her that the sky was the limit!
At that time we had no idea that JB spent about ANG 35.000,- (US$ 20.000.00) a month on the above mentioned lifestyle and that most of the money spent was coming from the monthly payments from the Ministry of Finance of St. Maarten (a client), from client proceeds which she was, by contract, obligated to transfer to the Taxand Curacao BV bank account and from charges on her company credit- and debit- cards. Partly also from clients handing her money intended for the Curacao Tax Receiver that never made its way there.

Later we were given to understand that her late husband had suddenly passed in 2007 (not due to natural causes) and that JB and her 2 daughters were left behind without any life insurance money at all.

Service Contract with Finance Minister of St.Maarten:

Before we merged into Taxand Curacao, JB was hired as legal adviser to the St. Maarten (one of the Islands that used to form the Netherlands Antilles) Minister of Finance, Mr. Hiro Shigemoto (MinFin).

The payments JB received for these duties were disclosed by her as being ANG. 15.750.00 a month for the year 2011. This meant that she should have transferred at least 12 X ANG. 15.750.00 =ANG.189.000.00 to the Taxand bank account that year. But unfortunately she only did so at her discretion; once in a while so that I wouldn't get suspicious. In January 2012 JB informed me that because of Taxand Curaçao’s collaboration in the St.Maarten Tax Reform Project, her duties as legal tax adviser to Minister Hiro Shigemoto had now changed to an on hourly basis only.

On our server I found the service contract between the MinFin and B & B Consultancy which states that the monthly payments to B & B are ANG. 17.500.00 per month excluding travel expenses, car rental etc. I also found the extension of the service contract for 2012. To conceal the fact that JB was withholding thousands of guilders for herself she produced phony invoices in our bookkeeping system of ANG. 15.750.00 to be paid by B & B, but we also found all of her actual B & B invoices to the MinFin which were between ANG. 20.000.00 & ANG. 48.000.00 a month including expenses which were carried by Taxand Curaçao. 

So she double-dipped with respect to these expenses. The SXM Minister of Finance paid these to her and she charged them to Taxand Curacao as well.

Tax Reform Project St.Maarten (SXM):
As the decision was made by the Government of St.Maarten to overhaul its tax system in 2011, JB introduced the Finance Minister Mr. Hiro Shigemoto (MinFin) to Taxand UK and VMW Taxand Netherlands. These two companies gave a presentation to the MinFin and his delegation (including JB as his legal tax adviser) in the Netherlands in October, 2011. This ultimately led to an engagement with Alvarez & Marsal Taxand UK, taking the lead and VMW Taxand NL / (Taxand Nederland) and Taxand Curacao as its respective subcontractors.

The engagement with respect to remuneration provided for a fee of USD. 11 million for the first year of work, of which US$ 2.560.000.00 was actually paid by the Government of St.Maarten to Alvarez & Marsal UK of which Taxand Curacao being the one which referred the project to Alvarez & Marsal UK, expected to receive about 10 percent of that amount ( Taxand Global Referral Program ) and through its involvement based on time spent on the project.

All companies started working on this project somewhere in December 2011. But while at the Taxand Global Conference in Madrid on April 28th, 2012, the SXM Cabinet fell, which meant that the MinFin would soon be removed from his position and replaced by the new Minister of Finance, Mr. Roland Tuitt.

Mr. Tuitt froze the Taxand Tax Reform Project immediately and hired the SOAB (Governmental Accountancy Bureau) to do a thorough investigation into the procedures that should have been followed for Taxand to be granted this US$ 11 million contract. While this was going on in SXM my relationship with JB, the Supervisory Board (consisting of Roelof Vos of VMW Taxand Netherlands/ Taxand Nederland and Manuel Candal of Taxand Venezuela)

had deteriorated to such a level –the fact that I exposed JB as a fraud and the cover-up by the SB- that my only option to control the damages was to break all ties with Taxand and to remove them from my premises on June 1st, 2012.

Suspicions of financial misconduct by partner Judith Brewster:
So far while working for  Taxand  Curacao I had not received any income to speak of. But as a young organization this is to be expected; my wife and I had been very lenient as landlords of the office building which Taxand Curacao was leasing in respect of rent arrears –which in April 2012 were around US$ 48.000.00-, and we even paid thousands of guilders in all kind of costs such as telephone, celebratory-, office adjustments- and personnel costs just to mention a few, to help with the start-up of Taxand Curacao.

When I started confronting JB (during her tenure as the one responsible of the company finances) to give me an explanation on the poor financial situation of the company, she answered that things were not going very well with the company and that we had a cash flow problem due to outstanding payments of our clients and that she was going to address the problems immediately.

But by April 2012 I became aware that JB was also performing poorly managing Taxand Curacao’s financials and immediately I reported this to Mr. Roelof Vos (SB Director) while we were both on SXM working on the SXM Tax Reform Project (SXM-TRP). I expected some support and feedback on how to proceed in this from him, but instead Mr. Vos told me that I was to put my attention on our Curacao-, and Bonaire- client’s only, and that JB and he himself would take care of the SXM-TRP and a similar project in Puerto Rico and one which they were trying to sell to the Government of Aruba (through one of my contacts!). He even ordered me to spend 2 months at our Bonaire office in the months July and August, 2012 (to get rid of me while he was at the Taxand Curacao office during those 2 months). I was shocked by his reaction towards my legitimate concerns about JB, but thought that because JB was the one who landed us the US$ 11 million SXM-TRP job he was not going to confront her with my concerns at that time. 

Being a statutory director I decided not to go to Bonaire but instead to focus on the Taxand Curacao financial situation. Vos also did not volunteer how Taxand would finance my being on Bonaire for 2 months as the Taxand coffers were completely depleted. So I surmise that I was ordered to go to Bonaire and stay there at my own expense. 

A few days later I received some complaints from our employees (4 tax professionals and 4 support staff) that their salaries were often paid late by JB and that they were fed up with her attitude towards them. I had also stumbled upon some odd expenditures from her side in the bookkeeping which I then realized was only partly presented to me in the previous 16 months, and ordered JB to turnover all her financial responsibilities to me on April 16th, 2012. I thought that if the SB would not take a stand in this matter, I would. Although she did hand over the bookkeeping, she still kept on dipping into the company’s coffers without my consent through her internet-banking privileges and misuse of her company credit and debit- cards.

Unfortunately, I was unable to attend the Annual Taxand Global 2012 Conference in Madrid Spain, due to the fact that there were no funds available for me to join her and the SB at the conference in Spain. But from the moment JB and her two daughters sat down in the in the airplane on April 23rd, 2012 on their way to Amsterdam, I was busy conducting a thorough investigation into the Taxand Curacao financials.

I presented the results, via e-mail, to all stakeholders on April 26th, 2012. The night before JB was to receive an award with respect to the St. Maarten engagement. One can imagine that by being instrumental in landing one of the biggest engagements in the Taxand Global history so far, JB was literally put upon a pedestal by both the Taxand Global Board and Taxand Curacao’s Supervisory Board.

In retaliation on my fact finding e-mail to the stakeholders, JB informed the SB & personnel in Curacao that I was on the brink of a financial crisis (bankruptcy was mentioned) and that she was expecting the worst. 

The pure evil of these words are striking. 

First she embezzles me of all income and then she states that I am in a financial crisis. 

By that time my findings into the financial misconduct of JB (in a nutshell) were as follows:
Most proceeds from the SXM Minister of Finance (MinFin) were not transferred to Taxand Curacao bank accounts;

JB kept servicing at least 25 clients through her own company;

She replenished her 2 Taxand and 1 B& B Consultancy credit cards constantly while most of the charges were for personal use. This of course with money belonging to Taxand Curacao;

A pedigree dog of US$ 1,100.00 was charged to the company’s bank account and added to my current account in the bookkeeping (ordered by JB to do so by our office manager);

US$ 2,200.00 in tickets to Miami for her and her 2 daughters in March, 2011 was charged on her brand new company credit card. She had told me however in April 2011 that her sister had surprised her with 3 tickets to Miami during the Easter Holidays ( a blatant lie:

During her vacation in Miami she transferred thousands of extra dollars to her credit cards for her personal use;

In March 2012 she charged a US$ 3100.00 couch on an other brand new company credit card;

Thousands of dollars were spent on jewelry she charged on her company credit cards. I remember that she once told me that she bought her sister Ruth Brewster (working for the MinFin) some jewelry and wanted to know from me how I felt about that. If only I knew then that all this jewelry was bought using our company credit cards! 

I now have the feeling that this jewelry was bought to give “thanks” to her sister. Please read between the lines here;

All travel expenses were charged on the company’s credit cards and later charged to the Government of SXM which proceeds she would keep on her company bank account (double-dipping);

Cash funds by clients that were intended for payment of taxes, social premiums and sales tax among others never reached their destination or the fiscal authorities;

Most personal telephone/internet was paid for by Taxand;

The stay with her sister Ruth in the Floris Suite Hotel during the Curacao North Sea Jazz Festival in 2011 were charged on the company credit card;

She charged thousands of guilders on supermarket purchases to the company;

Services, upgrades and twice-weekly VIP carwashes of her Audi A4 were paid for by Taxand;

All the above mentioned were charges which were mostly hidden in our bookkeeping or she pretended them to be business expenses. I charged around ANG. 15.000,- (US$ 8.500.00) to my credit cards in cash advances those 17 months, but this because I was financially drained to the extreme by then. All of these charges I reported as personal cash advances to be put on my personal current account in our bookkeeping by our bookkeeper/office manager.

Taxand Curacao’s 2011 financial statements were signed off by the Supervisory Board, Brewster and me. These financial statements however showed a B & B current account to an amount of ANG 298.000.-. (US$ 170.000.00). It now seems that for the first 5 months of 2012 another ANG. 287.000,- needs to be added to her current account totaling to the amount of ANG. 585.000,- (US$ 330.00.00) in 17 months. But according to Mr. Roelof Vos and Mr. Manuel Candal, JB’s current account was just that and had nothing to do with fraud. In 2016 the 2013 financials were approved and they showed Brewster owing over ANG 700,000.-- to Taxand.

Through some e-mails I found on the server it is now clear that during the conference in Madrid –at which the MinFin Shigemoto, Sherry Hazel (Secretary General of the MinFin), Ruth Boyrard-Brewster (Senior Policy Adviser at MinFin) and some other special guests of VMW Taxand NL / Taxand Nederland - a decision by the Supervisory Board and Brewster was made to get rid of me and to leave our office by ending the remaining 3 ½ year office lease. 

This explained the hostility by the SB, JB, and halfway May, 2012 also by our personnel who by then were informed by JB that they were leaving the office building and that I was being kicked-out of Taxand Curacao.

Position taken by the Supervisory Board of  Taxand Curacao and other interested parties.
After my numerous cries for help towards the Supervisory Board, which consisted of Mr. Roelof Vos and Mr. Manuel Candal (a Global Taxand Board Member himself) our local accountant was hired by the Supervisory Board to sort things out. This in a way was helpful but it also made my position rather powerless with respect to the situation as the accountant had to report directly to the Supervisory Board; so, on one hand I was responsible for the financials, where on the other hand I was not given enough insight to perform the necessary actions with respect to the finances. I had presented my findings to all parties concerned (JB; the Supervisory board and the coinciding board of shareholders), their stance however remained that it is merely a question of adjusting the current account of JB’s management company and then we could all go our merry way. Adjustments were never executed and to my knowledge JB was never demanded to redeem the current account which to this day remains in place.

During a conference call with JB, Mr. Vos and Mr. Proosten (who was the internal bookkeeper of VMW Taxand / Taxand Nederland and hopelessly incompetent), I suggested that JB could now start with transferring the funds received in her company during 2012 to Taxand Curaçao’s bank account. JB started shouting on the telephone and that was about it. This strengthened my opinion that JB had no intention of balancing her current account with Taxand Curacao and/or will (due to her lavish lifestyle) never be able to. It also showed that the Supervisory Board would not put any pressure on her to replenish the Taxand Curacao bank account with the funds she received on Taxand Curacao’s behalf as no comments to that extent were made during the conference call.

The above led to three conclusions:
The Taxand organization was bound to support JB no matter what happens; When I told Mr. Roelof Vos that I would cease to work in conjunction with JB, he explicitly stated that they would not let JB go, thus forcing me to stay in business with a fraud or leave the Taxand organization.

A second conclusion was that, apart from morality involved, there was no point for me to stay connected to Taxand. JB would be supported in receiving money in her own company and leaving Taxand Curacao with all the expenses thus allowing for a situation where there would never be any income for me.

Thirdly, because of my findings and the fact that they were presented to all stakeholders my working relation with JB had deteriorated to a level where normal cooperation seemed unfeasible.

JB’s position within Taxand at that time therefore was enormously strong. I revealed my findings to most of the Taxand Netherlands shareholder’s partners, but the general answer I got was that it was just a matter of making good appointments on who does what. Taxand Venezuela does not work on the St Maarten project so I expected they would be interested in good bookkeeping as they were looking forward to a major dividend distribution.

However during the meeting of May 7 2012, the Venezuelan partner –Mr. Manuel Candal – showed to favor JB in this dispute. Mr. Manuel Iglesias Candal  is a supervisory director of  Taxand  Curacao and a member of the worldwide board of directors of  Taxand Global (  www.taxand.com ). By supporting JB he made himself to be a facilitator of the fraud.

Also present at that meeting was Mr. Roelof Vos, the other supervisory director of  Taxand  Curacao and Mr. Morris Proosten (accountant of VMW Taxand/Taxand Nederland). JB’s position was strongly defended during that meeting and I was being threatened that among other the lease of our offices (which my wife and I own) would be cancelled. I was accused by JB of contacting the St. Maarten Minister of Finance on the telephone and telling him that I was upset that I was kicked out of the project. I have however done nothing of the sort. I once again expressed my concerns of the proven fraudulent actions of JB in the presence of JB and Mr. Proosten. To my amazement Mr. Vos, who later drafted the minutes of that meeting, made no reference whatsoever to my explicit remarks with respect to JB’s fraudulent behavior. Interesting also was that JB and I were asked during that meeting to destroy our bank and credit cards. JB and I both complied but at that time I did not know that JB had acquired a second credit card with one our banks which of course was not destroyed. And JB did not really care, because she still had her online bank privileges (of course I did not have these) so her fraudulent behavior continued through April, 2013 when she was caught by us stealing some US$ 1.250.00 from the last funds of Taxand Curacao!

For me it is incomprehensible that JB received the support from the other stakeholders with all the facts brought forward by me.

It is beyond me that an international financial organization will not deal swiftly with any breach of integrity.

Something simply did not add up here!.

The Break-up:
On May 31st, 2012 I had finally put my foot down by ending my collaboration with Taxand Curacao. This has led to a lot of issues among others that JB called the police over to our offices twice and threatened to have me hauled from my home on June 2nd, 2012 by the police. 

Imagine how one feels when a thief is actively being supported by the police.

On June 8th I had a meeting with Chris van Wijngaarden (partner with Taxand Nederland), his lawyer Mr. Thomas Aardenburg and Mr. Paul van de Laarschot (our then lawyer) to further discuss the separation of Taxand and M & A. Our lawyer suggested to terminate the relationship with JB. And further he suggested instead have me and a new partner Mr. Jeroen Starreveld, a non equity partner with law firm Spigt (who was promised a partnership at Taxand  Nederland later in 2013) to run Taxand Curacao together. 

This all been dismissed by Mr. Roelof Vos. As Chris van Wijngaarden and Aardenburg left our offices in a very distraught state which made me hopeful for a positive outcome at that time.

On Monday June 11, I had a telephone conversation with a Mr. Alex Sulkowski who formerly was one of the Taxand Global Board members. As I understand it  Mr. Frederic Donnedieu de Vabres  (the president and co-founder of  Taxand Global, http://www.taxand.com/our-people/frederic-donnedieu-de-vabres) had asked him to mediate with respect to the situation. But Mr. Alex Sulkowski was not interested in my issues, but demanded that the name Taxand be changed immediately! I never heard from him again. Till this day I do not understand how Taxand could have thought to remedy fraud through mediation.

During the shareholder’s meeting on August 24, 2012 we further discussed the fraud committed by JB. A written statement of the Supervisory Board was presented which focuses entirely on me thus trying to re-direct the attention from JB to me. During that meeting I was supposed to mandatory relinquish my shares in Taxand Curacao which I flatly refused as it was my belief that the paragraphs with respect to that were not written with fraud in mind. During the meeting of shareholders Mr. Franklin Bakhuis was appointed statutory director to replace JB who had resigned on August 10, 2012, five days before we presented our lawsuit against Taxand Curaçao in court. Our lawsuit consisted mainly of reimbursed expenses made on behalf of Taxand Curacao like Aqualectra (utilities, parking fees etc.) and such. Another reason for not relinquishing my shares was that Taxand basically refused to pay out dividends for the period of my involvement. I explained to them that only a shareholder can receive dividends but also that remark fell on deaf ears.

A third reason for not relinquishing the shares was that it was agreed upon that an exit of either Brewster or me would go along two possible lines:

1 Taxand Curacao would keep the clients and the person leaving would be remunerated; or,

2 The client portfolio would remain with the party that contributed that portfolio to Taxand Curacao.

What actually happened was that Taxand Curacao took the total portfolio and after a lot of haggling which took six weeks returned the Muller & Associates portfolio. So, where Taxand wanted us to adhere to the agreement it did not itself. 

The ruling of August 30, 2012 stated that we were awarded about half of the ANG. 105.000.- to be paid by Taxand Curaçao immediately, but up to now we have not been paid one cent. Alas, our lawyer billed us for a similar amount so in stead of winning a substantial amount of some ANG 140,000.-- we were left empty handed. That is one lawyer who will never again refer anyone to in my life.

UPDATE:
JB charges thousands of guilders in costs such as maintenance and service upgrades for her Audi A4, private storage charges, and much, much, more and Roelof Vos from VMW Taxand Netherlands / Taxand Nederland (one of our shareholders) also charged around ANG. 80,000, - (without the consent of the managing directors) to the Taxand Account including: EURO 11 for an Netherlands Chamber of Commerce excerpt, KM automobile charges in the Netherlands to Euro 3,904,- for one of many KLM Business Class tickets for Mr. Roelof Vos to Euro 1778.72 for the flight and stay of one of VMW Taxand’s partners’ family vacation in a 3-bedroom Villa at Blue Bay Resort, just to mention a few! These costs are excluding US$ 20.000.00 Roelof Vos granted himself and Mr. Manuel Candal as remuneration for their duties (???) as Supervisory Directors. Consultax is a company owned by Candal and this company has received mentioned USD 20,000 on behalf of Candal for services rendered with respect to accountancy services. The investigator had serious doubts about any work performed by Consultax. We have no doubts as we never heard of Consultax before the fraud was exposed.

The above makes Roelof Vos into a fraud as well.

VMW Taxand Netherlands role in the situation:
In May, 2012 a payment from  Alvarez and Marsal Taxand UK  (A&M Taxand) of around US$ 200,000.00 which was intended for Taxand Curacao, was due to my accusations of fraud by JB, probably transferred to the bank account of VMW Taxand Netherlands. It may also have been transferred to Consultax (see here under at “Remarks regarding Taxand Curacao bookkeeping“.) I have requested VMW Taxand to have this money transferred to Taxand Curacao, but I never received an answer on my request. This is why on January 21st, 2013 I addressed the public prosecutor to accuse VMW Taxand Netherlands of embezzlement of US$ 200.000.00.

Conclusion: All parties involved have benefited from- or through- Taxand Curacao BV except me. I was left to carry the expenses and do the hard work.

In the mean time…..

JB had in the mean time established a new company called Dutch Caribbean Tax Services BV on October 2, 2012. Between September 20, 2012 and October 1, 2012 JB coaxed the Giro bank in extending the Taxand Curacao line of credit from ANG 30,000 to ANG 105,000. The amount in the Giro bank was minus ANG.-103,916.23 per October 17, 2012. It seems that at least an other ANG 50,000 again was taken by Mrs. Brewster. This happened at a moment that JB was not a statutory director of the company. So, Mrs. Brewster was not legally binding Taxand Curacao but Taxand Curacao received a loan that mysteriously disappeared. We had seized the Taxand Curacao bank accounts and the bank's general conditions prohibits extensions of loans under such circumstances but who cares when it is Brewster and when it is Girobank?

Brewster had therefore once again committed fraud by misrepresenting herself to Girobank as a statutory director and signing of on a loan in that capacity. She was assisted by a totally corrupt Girobank employee who no works for MCB Bank.

At that moment the registry of the Curacao Commercial Register stated that: “The registration of Taxand Curacao (TC) is discontinued as of October 30, 2012.”

On November 2, 2012 we received an e-mail from the Taxand lawyer which basically said that  VMW  Taxand Netherlands  and Taxand Venezuela had broken all ties with Taxand Curacao. The shares were transferred to JB and Vos and Candal had resigned as supervisory directors.

IFact also is that JB as a consequence is unable to pay the salaries of the Taxand staff starting end of November. So, you steal some USD 500,000.00 and then you are not able to cough up a mere USD 7,000 in salaries? We are now talking about the period far in 2013 and JB was at that time still being chased by her former staff with respect to these salaries. JB on the other hand was spotted once again in the Curacao Renaissance Hotel during the 2013 Easter Break. On April 10 we received bank statements from the RBC bank and it showed that JB is still taking money out of that bank account. The only connection between herself and Taxand Curacao is that she is a shareholder like I am. Keep in mind that according to the Chamber of Commerce the registration of Taxand is discontinued. The company can therefore not be active anymore and she is not entitled to take any funds from the bank accounts. So the thieving had not come to end at that time.

Where is it allowed that mere shareholders take money from the company they own shares in? They are only allowed to receive dividends after this has been decided by the Shareholders' meeting.

The Media:
On Thursday November 28, 2012 a local newspaper “Extra” published an article suggesting that JB is under investigation and will in due time be prosecuted by the Public Prosecutors on St. Maarten and on Curacao. This article was published in the local language “Papiamentu”. It is a transcript from an article published on SMN-news.com which you may find at:

http://smn-news.com/st-maarten-st-martin-news/10684-taxand-curacao-files-complaint-against-judith-brewster-allegation-of-defrauding-taxand-of-naf-100-000-00.html

I will of course support the public prosecutors in St. Maarten and Curacao in any way I can to prosecute Judith Brewster. Maybe this way we can prevent her to harm others in the future. The scope of the fraud is enormous; the scope of damage done to me and third parties is also very substantial.

I have also cooperated with the investigations which are currently conducted by the government of St. Maarten into the “Taxand Scandal” by Alvarez and Marsal Taxand UK (  A&M Taxand  ) represented by Mr. Richard Baxter and VMW Taxand NL represented by Mr. Roelof Vos. From a legal standpoint it is also remarkable to see that the Taxand Curacao supervisory directors did not seek to have Brewster being prosecuted nor made any attempts to have her redeem her “current account issue” with Taxand Curacao.

Taxand in St.Maarten Media:

http://www.smn-news.com/archive-news-search.html?searchword=taxand
http://www.todaysxm.com/?s=taxand

VMW Taxand in Dutch Media:

http://www.advocatie.nl/page?1,8312/kantoren/de_roemloze_ondergang_van_taxand_curacao
http://www.ftm.nl/copypaste/de-ondergang-van-taxand-cura%C3%A7ao.aspx

My Blog Spot:

http://caribbeantaxlawyer.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-inglorious-demise-of-taxand-curacao.html
http://caribbeantaxlawyer.blogspot.com/2013/03/letter-to-taxand-lawyer-mr-aardenburg.html

Position Paper of Peter Muller: April 2012 – March 2013:

http://caribbeantaxlawyer.blogspot.com/2013_03_01_archive.html

http://www.todaysxm.com/2013/06/17/judith-brewster-took-money-from-tc-account-court-appoints-manager-at-former-taxand-curacao/

ST. MAARTEN:
In September 2012 Mrs. Ruth Boyrard-Brewster (sister of JB) was transferred from her position at the Ministry of Finance of  St. Maarten to the Department of Health.

On December 17, 2012 Former Minister of Finances Mr. Hiro Shigemoto was arrested on suspicion of fraud, forgery and money laundering. He spent 7 days in custody and was being interrogated every day. Something must be awfully wrong otherwise one would not arrest a former Minister and son in law of the Minister of Justice! Much later Mr. Shigemoto was however acquitted of all charges.

In the first week of January, 2013 Sherry Hazel (sister in law of the Governor of St.Maarten) and Secretary General of the Ministry of Finance, was also transferred from finance to an other, but unknown to us, department.

The SOAB Report on the TAXAND Tax Reform Project and the granting of a service contract to Mrs. Judith Brewster’s company B & B Consultancy of which its results have been available to the Minister of Finance of St. Maarten Mr. Tuitt since November, 2012, has yet to be made public. Tuitt did mention on St. Maarten radio however that SOAB had discovered 15 disputable facts surrounding the Taxand contract.

On April 8th I have sent once again an email to Donnedieu de Vabres, the Taxand Global Board chairman requesting for a solution to this whole mess. So far Donnedieu has not replied to any of my e-mails to him.

Taxand Netherlands is not doing very well. Well established partners are leaving with their clients and associates are on the brink of being fired. Later -much later- I was to find out that Roelof Vos and an other Taxand Netherlands had de facto taking the lead in that organization. Mrs. de Muinck Keizer could at best be described as a powerless managing director. The other shareholders -all lawyers- looked upon this situation and acted too late to reverse the situation where money earned in the past has been spent by Roelof Vos and his crony. This crony passed on July 15, 2022. I will not speak ill of the dead so I shall leave his name unmentioned. Suffices to say that crony number 2 did not reach the age of 62. 

Karma gives an itch.

Imagine that the SB would have executed their duties in a normal manner; what would have happened? For one Taxand Curacao would still be in place and all the expenses carried by all parties involved would still yield income for the Taxand Curacao employees and its shareholders. Taxand would remain with its worldwide reputation intact. Now Taxand Curacao basically is no more and the Taxand worldwide reputation must have suffered greatly. So decisions made were not only immoral but also not very beneficial to Taxand.

A combination of stupidity and arrogance has led to disaster.
I am still waiting for a reply from the President of the Taxand Global Board on any of my e-mails. An explanation why the above occurred the way it occurred has never been provided for. Finally, imagine that wherever you read Taxand above you would read the name of one of the Big Four firms.
How would this then have played out?

Remarks regarding Taxand Curacao bookkeeping:
We were unable to review the Taxand bookkeeping system until April 15 2013 when we hired an external accountant who was in possession of the right Quickbooks version. We are in possession of the digital administration from the start up in January 2011 until October 2012.

I have more than once been physically threatened by goons sent my way by Mrs. Brewster. This only strengthens my determination and provides for proof we are following the right path.

Inquiry Proceedings: Muller & Associates vs ( Roelof Vos, Manuel Candal & Judith Brewster) Taxand Curacao:
We started inquiry proceedings with the Curacao Court of appeals. We have asked the Court to have investigated if the behavior of Judith Brewster, Manuel Candal and Roelof Vos can be viewed upon as mismanagement. I have been accused of mismanagement by them. Never understood that one; I detect fraud, report it with the Supervisory Board which immediately starts supporting the fraud until they can no more and as a consequence I am the fraudulent one? Any reasonable person who puts this in the balance will know the outcome. The first stage of the inquiry was craftily frustrated by Judith Brewster through simply stating that she and her attorney would be unavailable. At that time a date for the hearing was set at somewhere last week of May. As a consequence I filed for the temporary appointment of a statutory director for Taxand Curacao. The Court of Appeals deemed this request not suitable for delay so before the court appeared Muller & Associates (me), Judith Brewster, lawyer Thomas Aardenburg and the last statutory director Mr. Franklin Bakhuis. Judith Brewster and Aardenburg ventilated no objections against our request so Friday May 29th we received a ruling that a statutory director would be appointed and also that the Court had somebody in mind already. This person was Chris de Bres, the only lawyer on these islands with hands-on experience with regard to (Dutch) inquiry proceedings at that time. Mr. De Bres started investigating the Taxand mess and trying to find a solution.

On October 30, 2013 we finally had our day in court with respect to our request to start an inquiry at Taxand Curacao BV. I pleaded for half an hour, Aardenburg for like 6 minutes and Brewster stumbled on for some 2 minutes. Outcome: the Court wanted to give us a chance to reach an amicable outcome. 

Who can deny that? So, we followed that path for a week and a day just find out that our friends persisted in solving this matter via mediation. Right, you need to reimburse the company and pursuant to that yours truly can be reimbursed. So I need to mediate with people sitting on some USD 500,000.-- looking me in the eye and laughingly telling me after 18 months "enjoy watching us not refunding Taxand Curacao?" Not a very enticing perspective. 

Part of the mediation would also be that is mediation would fail I would not be allowed to take further legal action. I may be stupid but I am no fool. They would of course have the mediation fail as that would be in their advantage.

On Saturday, November 9 2013 I was approached by someone with intimate knowledge of the situation within VMW Taxand. He explained to me that finally the Dutch partners saw Roelof Vos for the person he is and acted accordingly. VMW Taxand will probably be liquidated and from that, three new firms shall arise. A law firm headed by the current VMW Taxand statutory director Mrs. Wietje de Muinck Keizer, a notary firm headed my Mr. Floris Janse de Jonge, and a tax law firm that will bear the name Taxand Netherlands. This latter firm is to be headed by Marc Sanders.

Roelof Vos, being found out for the backstabber that he is, will not come back in this new structure.

After franticly looking for new employment with among other Taxand Austria Mr. Vos was finally hired by Hertoghs. A law firm specializing in criminal tax cases 

Hertoghs opened offices in Amsterdam where Roelof Vos lives but they do not dare to have him run this office as they are obviously quite aware of what he is capable of.
I find it rather baffling that he was even hired there and it reflects badly on those offices and its founder, Mr. Hertoghs, who was basically the inventor of criminal tax law in the Netherlands.

He was a great lawyer and also a great teacher.

This is however a local Dutch law firm and as Mr. Vos likes to travel (just not at his ow expense) he was soon spotted to be looking for a different workplace. Twice so far I have been asked to provide for background on Mr. Vos so twice I have been able to prevent him finding a different workplace. 

I do hope that this blog post will be convincing enough not to hire Mr. Vos in any (legal) position.

Unless one has money to burn of course.

On December 10, 2013 we had another short moment in court when we could address the appellate court and a colleague of Thomas Aardenburg's to inform the court that we were not able to solve our differences amicably. We could not hand our papers to Mrs. Brewster as she and her "adviser" Willem Felix Braak arrived too late in the courthouse.

Willem Felix Braak has so far threatened to log a complaint with the police, to take me to court and I have also been threatened physically by him. He has e-mailed me (how stupid is that) that it would be better for my health if I would just stop writing about Brewster.

I received a rather distressed letter from Thomas Aardenburg that I should remove all content that refers to his clients from this blog. If not he will take me to court. I do so very much hope that he will do just that.

In return I e-mailed him that I would rather solve this matter amicably via mediation as that seems to be his chosen path for solving my issues with Taxand. Aardenburg never took us to court on this and of course mediation was also not discussed any further.

Thomas Aardenburg threatened to take me to court once again on December 19, 2013. I have replied that basically there is no slander as it is all the truth. The fact that the truth reflects negatively on his clients is something only they can resolve themselves. I am a forgiving person, so if this lot would simply cough up my fair share of the Taxand Curacao income I will take appropriate measures. I am somewhat unafraid of a slander court case however as I am only stating facts here.

Thanks to the fact that Brewster cannot dip into my income anymore that may not happen. Do I understand that they do not like this blog? Of course I do.

On Friday December 27th, 2013 the bailiff came by our house to hand us the announcement by Brewster for a general meeting of shareholders of TC. She must have totally overlooked the fact that I -as private person- do not own shares in that company and neither does she. So the announcement is from a legal standpoint null and void but try explaining that to her.

She is quite crafty when it comes to stealing, lying and defrauding but when it comes to (simple) legal matters she does not seem to have a clue.

We tried to explain it to her however, but so far we did not get a response from her.

So we filed a request with the Court to basically take away the voting rights that come with the shares that actually were never transferred to B & B Consultancy in the first place.

The court has responded that on January 14, 2013 a decision (beschikking) will go out on our request for an inquiry and also with respect to our request for the temporary measure to revoke the voting rights with regard to the shares that were/are held by VMW Taxand and by SPF De Nieuwe Wereld. This decision has turned out to be an intermediate decision where the court first wants to make sure that we can cough up enough money to pay for an investigator. It is actually a substantial amount. We find that quite reassuring because by demanding a stiff sum the court seems on the path to hire a very qualified investigator.

Furthermore,  on January 20th, 2014, Brewster had the audacity to actually hold the General Meeting of Shareholders and a new patsy has been appointed as statutory director or so they claim as minutes of the meeting so far have not been produced.

But even then, the appointment will eventually fall through for among other the reasons mentioned above. Mr. Willem Felix Braak now claims to hold the helm of the sinking ship that is Taxand Curacao.

I have warned him about the minefield he has now entered and I have explained to him that in no way he can be considered a statutory director of Taxand Curacao. I have even explained that if on the other hand he starts behaving like a director, that this will give rise to liability on his side. Brewster told the court (via email of January 7, 2014) that she had found somebody that would work on a "no cure no pay basis". So on January 22nd, 2014 we already received an e-mail from Mr. Willem Felix Braak discussing among other his remuneration. 

That obviously is not "no cure, no pay".

So, again Taxand Curacao has a fraud for a director.

In the second week of February 2014 we were accosted by a former client, Mrs. M. She had paid a retainer fee to Taxand Curacao but the intended work was never executed as Mrs. M. never produced the necessary documents. Now she wants Muller & Associates to refund her. I told her that as she has paid Taxand Curacao it is this company that should refund her. I have contacted Taxand Curacao (Willem Felix Braak) about this and as could have been expected they of course are adamant about the fact that Muller & Associates should refund Mrs. M. which defies all logic, but fits their behavior so far.

At that time I was still paying the Taxand internet bills, which Taxand  Curacao never paid, and which had no connection to Muller & Associates as we concluded the contract with the internet provider. 

This however is something completely different. We are a huge creditor of Taxand for among other, dividend, rent, management fees and such and now they want us to refund their clients. 

They even sent a letter to Mrs. M. -after we kicked them out- notifying her with respect to their change of address. Now they feel Mrs. M. is our client which is fine, but please refund her. 

Taxand took her money, it is up to Taxand to refund her and no one else.

It was not easy to obtain a bank-guarantee but we managed to do so. This means that the Appellate Court can now give a decision with respect to the inquiry.

Mismanagement is basically always there in situations where directors act against the articles of incorporation of a company.

Did this occur within Taxand Curacao? Quite so:

1. The shares which were held by SPF De Nieuwe Wereld (Manuel Candal) and by VMW Taxand, were supposedly sold to B & B (the company of the fraudulent Brewster) for an amount of supposedly ANG. 50,000.00 ( which came from the infamous  Alvarez & Marsal  payment ). In accordance with the articles of incorporation these shares had had to be offered to M & A (my company) as well. That never happened so that is strike 1.

2. When it was established that during 2011 Brewster had taken some ANG 300,000,-- from Taxand Curacao this was booked as a loan in the financials. The articles of incorporation however state that in case a director takes out a loan surmounting Euro 25,000 the Supervisory Directors should give (prior) approval with respect to such loan. That approval was never extended so that is strike 2.

3.  Brewster decides to hold a General Shareholders Meeting and invites me to that meeting. Brewster is not a shareholder and neither am I. We hold shares indirectly via our own companies B & B and M & A. Strike 3.

4.  When you hold this meeting the articles of incorporation demand that you present the financials of the previous year. Brewster however holds a meeting during which the only issue that is tabled is the appointment of Willem Felix Braak as a managing director. Strike 4, and you are out!

5. The Supervisory Board also remunerated themselves but "forgot" that the General Assembly of Shareholders has to approve this remuneration.

The funny thing is that at a certain point Willem Felix Braak informed me that he no longer serves as a managing director, as his appointment was never ratified. I then communicated to him that this reflects oddly to his behavior of the past 4 weeks where he constantly mentioned that he is the one and only managing director. So I ask him to elaborate on his actions as deemed managing director in order for me to determine if he should also fall under the scope of the inquiry.
Now he answers that he actually still is and for the duration has been managing director. He does not seem to have a grasp with respect to a simple question whether he is or is not the managing director of  Taxand Curacao. I therefore classify him as a total idiot.

Furthermore:
As soon as the bank guarantee is ready and to the liking of the Appellate Court, they will then hopefully come with a final decision on whether to start the inquiry at Taxand a.s.a.p. This means that if indeed the inquiry will be conducted, the court will appoint a skilled (forensic) investigator who will write a report on among other, the by M&A accusations of mismanagement by Judith Brewster, Roelof Vos & Manuel Candal and its consequences. I may also be investigated in the inquiry which was filed by Muller & Associates, but I  do welcome this because I have nothing to hide.

Once the report is finished & available to the public, as promised it will also be sent to the different authorities in Curacao, St.Maarten & The Netherlands.

So, March 25th we received the Appellate Court decision that an investigation would be started. Exactly a week later on April fool's day we received a further decision that renowned Dutch corporate lawyer Mr. Leo Spigt has been appointed as the investigator. In the mean time a meeting has been set up for the second week of April 2014.

We requested the Court to temporarily refrain the Taxand shareholders B & B from voting. We requested same with respect to the shares that are of were held held by Private Foundation De Nieuwe Wereld and those held by VMW Taxand. These shares were all transferred, or so it was argued by lawyer Aardenburg, to B & B. This transfer of shares however goes completely against the statutes of incorporation of Taxand Curacao and therefore has never occurred (from a legal point of view). The subsequent hearing held on June 4th was interesting. Aardenburg produced prints from this blog and so did Brewster. Brewster explained to the Court that she could simply not redeem her debt with Taxand Curacao because no bank would extend her a loan. That of course as a consequence of this blog. 

Further the court was informed by Aardenburg and Brewster that I should redeem my debts with Taxand Curacao as well. That is a good one. Taxand Curacao owes me hundreds of thousands of guilders and indeed there is a small withdrawal of some US$ 3,000 from my part as well. You must be totally without shame to be able to make such a statement in front of judges of a Court of Appeal. 

For us during all the trials and tribulations it became quite an ordeal to keep the lawyers of SBA (Soliana, Bonapart & Aardenburg) at bay. 

Mind you, my wife and I were without lawyers. We defended ourselves.

SBA -or rather lawyer Aardenburg has also sent many letters demanding to stop blogging about the Taxand scandal. I have always replied the same: please tell where I am wrong and I will correct that. 

I never got an answer to that one. I am merely blotting down facts and my emotions.

On Friday October 24, 2014 we had another court case with respect to my request to appoint my company as statutory director of Taxand Curacao and take away the voting rights of the shares of B &B and the other shares of which now nobody agrees which party legally holds these shares. 

Happy go lucky Brewster provided further proof of her being criminally prosecuted by showing court papers giving a report of police and criminal prosecutors entering and searching her home, her offices and a storage container. 

Her accompanying statement was that this was proof that there was no wrongdoing.

Imagine the reaction of all present -and especially the judges- when that statement was delivered to the court.

The Curacao Court of Appeal rendered its decisions on our requests on November 7, 2014. The decisions being that mentioned voting rights were set aside by the court. As a result only M & A can legally vote during a shareholders meeting.

Furthermore, I was appointed sole director of TC B.V. which I felt as quite a victory and a vote of confidence. As director I immediately sent a fax to Brewster demanding that she pay back her debts and also to hand over assets of TC BV that she still keeps as if they were hers.

I also sent lawyer Aardenburg a fax concerning his clients' (former supervisory directors Manuel Candal and Roelof Vos) alleged claims against TC B.V. I also e-mailed Mr. David Pert, managing partner of Alvarez & Marsal UK for a clarification of the payment of US$ 200.000.00 which was paid to VMW Taxand Netherlands instead of TC B.V. As said before we do hope that Alvarez & Marsal UK will step up to the plate and cooperate by providing this information to me a.s.a.p. They never did. 

Taxand can in my opinion therefore be best described as basically an international criminal organization.

Wietje De Muinck Keizer of VMW Taxand was notified that she should provide for clarification pertaining to receiving some US$ 200,000.00 from Alvarez & Marsal Taxand UK, which was intended for Taxand Curacao. Deadlines were set and unfortunately breached.

Mrs. Brewster finally submitted part of the Taxand Curacao bookkeeping. 

Whereas she had always claimed she never had any bookkeeping under her! 

She however did not hand over the company's assets but instead she went to the storage company and embezzled what was left.

 Any redemption of the debt to former Taxand Curacao has also not taken place as of yet. 

We demanded Brewster to hand over the Quickbooks Program update that was bought at the expense of TC BV, and she surprised us by stating that the National Detectives of St. Maarten had seized the pc that contained this information. 

So now it seems that criminal charges from St.Maarten are being composed against Mrs. Brewster as well.

We were further glad to hear that Mrs. Brewster yet again, has availed herself of the services of a lawyer. We were accosted by Mr. Roy Bottse Esq. of (then) SMS lawyers on December 15th, 2014. 

(I need to stipulate here that there are two lawyers named Bottse in Curacao. One is the mentioned Roy Bottse and the other named Robert Bottse is a partner at the offices of HBN).

Roy Bottse politely asked us to address him with matters regarding the TC BV inquiry. 

This is the third lawyer that has been hired by Mrs. Brewster so far. First we were given opposition by lawyer Mrs. Nagelmakers who has her own firm and subsequently by the late Mr. Gelmer Pieter. 

It is my belief that Brewster did not pay these lawyers as they stopped working for her.

The Court of Appeals has rendered in final decision the question of mismanagement within Taxand on February 17, 2015. The Court concluded that indeed there was mismanagement within Taxand and that this mismanagement is mainly due to Brewster. The lack of supervision by the Supervisory Board cannot be described as mismanagement but the Court does say that here was lack of supervision. We of course feel differently  regarding this matter but the legal process needs to be upheld and respected and that is exactly what we shall do.

I am still the only director in the company and M & A is still the only shareholder with voting rights. End of May 2015 we finalized the 2012 financials of M & A. A major conclusion is that Brewster now owes Taxand a whopping ANG 7 hundred thousand (close to USD 400,000.--. We have filed  two court cases against Brewster, one with respect to recovery of the costs of the inquiry, one regarding her creditcard expenses and overpaying of management fees. Verdicts are expected for December 14, 2015.

In the mean time Brewster has also filed a case against me and my company, She has done so within the inquiry procedure that I started. I do not believe that to be legally feasible but we are going to court on this on December 17, 2015. I wonder if it is a coincidence that this date is set 3 days after the verdicts of our first cases against Brewster are to come out. On December 14 however the court informed us that the verdicts for our cases against Brewster will now be rendered on February 1st 2016. 

The case Brewster made against me was extremely funny. I argued before the Court of Appeals that Brewster had no idea what she was doing and that the Court should not even hear her case. 

The Court insofar agreed that they changed Brewster's requests into something that fits within Curacao inquiry law. Brewster's new lawyer mr. Roy Bottse, at one hand is more professional than what I have seen from many lawyers this year but on the other hand he does not seem to know the first thing about corporate inquiry law. 

The decision on this case were supposed to be rendered on January 12 of 2016. 

Well that date passed by and finally in February Brewster's requests were denied by the Appellate Court. 

The verdict against Brewster that was expected for December 14, 2015 were finally rendered on March 21, 2015. The court agreed with us and the verdicts were that Brewster was to majorly contribute to the expenses of the inquiry (basically the costs involved with hiring Mr. Spigt esq.) and that she was to cough up her credit card expenses.

We still have to go after the big bucks Brewster misappropriated from Taxand Curacao and the income she did not contribute. That now mounts to some ANG 700,000.--.

The court fees of these law suits are staggering, so we are currently holding our horses here. We have called for a general meeting of shareholders in the second week of May during which we want to approve the 2013 Financials. 

Brewster's company is still at her old address at Doormanweg where she has been expelled for not paying the rent. 

We have sent the invite for that general meeting to that address, it being the formal address. We have proof or receipt so this meeting shall be a great surprise for her afterwards. 

Same goes for VMW Taxand; they have also moved so we sent an invite by registered mail to their formal address. 

Formal addresses are shown in the Trade Register of the Chamber of Commerce. 

We have warned Brewster time after time to file the correct address but she simply will not listen. 

Now she will not know that a general meeting of shareholders has been called. May 5th 2016 we were at the Appellate Court once again to apply for an extension of my directorship and to have the other shareholders remaining without voting rights. 

Last week Brewster sent a mail to the court that her lawyer Mr. Roy Bottse would be unavailable.

Mr. Roy Bottse however sent a separate mail stating that he no longer is Brewster's attorney.
Brewster was caught with yet another lie.

The court will render decisions on our requests on June 7th.

It was decided that I shall remain director for the duration that is to say until November 2017. 

The  auction date of Mrs. Brewster's unfinished home was set on July 14, 2016 at 14.00 hrs. 

The notary just informed me that Brewster owes Girobank over ANG one million in mortgages related to this loan. 

The whole property may be worth some ANG 400,000.-- so I do not understand how Girobank has created this situation. 

Girobank had the right -holding the mortgage- to take over the auction proceedings but chose not to. We did receive communications however that Girobank does not approve of our starting price at the auction which was set low to attract enough interest for this auction. 

Brewster can of course prevent the auction by paying what is due to Taxand or come up with a reasonable proposal but that does not seem to come across her mind. 

That also means of course that it will in the long run not make much sense to keep coming after Brewster as she seems to be out of funds. 

Logically we would then pursue with filing for her personal bankrupcy. 

Otherwise she would simply getting away with defrauding Taxand, my wife, my company and me.

We auctioned off her unfinished "Dream Home" in Villapark Zuurzak:

On July 14, 2016 Mrs Brewster's unfinished home in Villapark Zuurzak was auctioned off. For reasons of privacy regarding the buyer I will not divulge the amount it went for. 

Being the one who started this auction I was the one to allow the property to go for this price which I did allow it to go for. 

I didn't really care as with all the mortgages on this property I was not to receive any income from this auction. 

It was my intention to put pressure on Brewster so that she would start paying her debts at Taxand Curacao. Brewster did not pay nor made any proposals to prevent the auction so we let it go through.

I did find it a bit risky then because if the property would not be auctioned off we were to carry the costs of the auction and those costs are rather steep.

But the house was auctioned off and at least we had a little revenge. 

It was very a very satisfying moment to sign off on transferring Mrs. Brewster's "Dream Home" to the buyer. I have never been in a situation like this before and probably never will be but I had to give permission to the notary to actually transfer the title of the house to the new owner. I truly loved doing that. Later I had to actually transfer this house to the buyer. This by notarial deed. Loved doing that.

It is almost 10 years years ago that, my wife Piroska, and I, made that faithful decision to not let this humongous fraud by Brewster slide by. A fraud assisted and condoned by the Taxand Supervisory Board

We've made huge costs and put in a lot of time and finally we are at least getting back at her.

A very satisfactory feeling let me assure you.

Girobank had informed us that her debts with that bank were over one million Antilles guilders. The bank is left with some 800 thousand Antilles guilders still outstanding. In USD this would mount to some 460.000,--.

On Monday March 20, 2017 we auctioned of Mrs. Brewster's belongings like furniture and such. Contrary to her lavish lifestyle her households assets were rather shabby so we did not fetch much from that public auction. Even worse the expenses overshadowed the yield with some USD 1,000.--. But at least she fled the Villa at Jan Sofat 190A - a huge rental villa with its own private beach and pier at Spanish Water- right after the bailiffs stormed the villa and took most of her possessions away to be auctioned at a later date. 

My very clever wife bought some stuff at the auction that we were later able to sell. 

The proceeds were used for a very well deserved culinary vacation in Lima, Peru.

Among other we had fried piranha skin:

As I had dealt with a few piranhas I can now say that I had piranha for dinner funded by a human piranha!

In 2016 Girobank had started proceedings against me, my wife and Brewster for an outstanding loan. 

To make a long story short we were able to convince the judge that this loan belongs to Brewster and it is up to her to repay the bank. 

The judge found it such an open and shut case the we did not even need to appear in court. 

He gave a verdict without even seeing the parties involved.

Girobank can now add another 50 thousand guilders to Brewster's debt list.

In October 2017 we started proceedings to auction Brewster's parental home in Suffisant with a  market value of probably less than ANG 100.000.--. When we contacted the MCB Bank with the question if they would take over the auction they declined. We were told however that auctioning of this property would make no sense as Brewster's debt to this bank is over ANG 100,000.--. That baffled us. Brewster obtained a loan on this property for ANG 97,000.-- in April 2013 and after 4 years the outstanding amount was much higher? What happened here. Disappointing to us because this means that once again our efforts will only bring revenge but no monetary compensation.

We shall however keep hunting Brewster down. Her -known to us debts- are now:

Girobank                                    : approximately ANG 1 million
MCB Bank                                 : approximately ANG 100,000.--
TC BV                                        : approximately ANG 700,000.--.
The Tax Inspector of Curacao    : many, many ANG's
Uncle Pieter                                : 80 thousand Euro and counting
Peter Muller                                : over ANG 600 thousand in damages

Anyone interested in extending loans to Brewster?

On November 8, 2017 our tenure as court appointed managing director to Taxand Curacao ended.
We notified the Curacao Chamber of Commerce with respect to that and also stopped providing for domicile to this company.

Parallel issues
After Brewster's fraud had been discovered and exposed by us we went to Girobank and told them we needed a two signature signing systems for payments made by Taxand. After I left, this two signing system was abolished by Girobank. 

Because of Brewster's fraud we never had any funds so Taxand had acquired a overdraft facility from Girobank. 

So Brewster kept spending Taxand's money thus increasing the overdraft and then Girobank took me to court as Brewster and I had both given personal guarantees. The case against me was thrown out by the Judge and Brewster did not defend herself so this adds up to her many debts.

Further a client took us to court as Brewster had embezzled their fund as well. Why not take Brewster to court? Nobody sees a point in doing that; she is difficult to find and has obviously sheltered her assets (if any). This former client also lost their case against us and also appealed. So even after six years we still are being faced by issues arising from the fraud as committed by Brewster and supported by Manuel Candal and Roelof Vos.

Brewster still owns a residential home in Suffisant. The lessee had become a friend of ours. Brewster tried to terminate the lease contract. On the letter she wrote to the lessee Brewster did not enter an address so basically the lessee could not respond to this termination of the lease. We knew that Brewster was staying in Seroe Lora Estate 51. We have drafted a letter for the lessee stating that the lease basically not be terminated by her and knowing the address we had the bailiff deliver this to her.

The weird thing is that Brewster enters into lease contracts for office space and housing and consequently does not pay the rent, or not the amount agreed upon and never in time when she does pay. 

But in a case where she is the landlady she expects perfect behavior from her tenants.
Brewster has in the mean time taken this a step further and has addressed a special court that only takes rent cases. I will represent the lessee free of charge of course. On August 3, 2018 Brewster received a whopping 17 productions from me that I will use in this court case. The case is set for August 13, 2018.

To cut a long story short we lost that case for Brewster's tenant but as I had told the court and Brewster during the trial I shall now auction off that property as well. After having won that trial Brewster showed enormous happiness and pride. She promised me she would pay the rent (that I had seized in 2016) to me. when I explained to her that her promises are totally worthless and that I would follow up by now auctioning off her parental home she totally freaked out.

I have received emails in which I am being described as an imbecile.

That really shows her wisdom. I have the power to auction off your house and you reply by insulting me?
I made her an offer and told she could either accept or reject the offer,  just not modify or negotiate on it. She wrote to me that she is resolutely declining my offer.

She seems to rather lose two houses and her inventory that pay one penny to me out of her free will.

Please find below a google maps picture of Brewster's second real estate property ready to be auctioned off:

It is obviously not a very expensive property. Still, it has three bedrooms and is well positioned on the wind. The land lease is only ANG 50 per year. Situated in Suffisant where the English speaking black Shell laborers were housed back in the day.

I have also taken the liberty of forwarding her address to Girobank so that they can contact her. She must owe Girobank over USD 600 thousand. 

My actions must have angered Mrs. Brewster as she seems to have filed a law suit against me on June 12, 2018. She tried to do that under the inquiry as started by me. 

That inquiry had however run its course and ended November 7, 2017. As Brewster filed her suit without including me in the email directed to the Court of Appeal I was quite surprised to receive an email from the Court's clerk answering to Mrs. Brewster that they would not receive any more correspondence under the inquiry. 

She wrote the Court's clerk that she will file a "normal" lawsuit against me which she will not as she lacks as much the money as the intelligence to do so and hardly any self respecting lawyer will take her on as a client on this little island nation. To be honest I hope she does. I will retaliate like never before. So the lease on Eemstraat was terminated end of February and Mrs. Brewster emailed that I was expected to hand over the keys and transfer the utilities to her name. As you may appreciate I do not want to be ordered around by Brewster so I did not respond to the email. Before it was 6 o' clock I had the police after me threatening that I was committing the crime of embezzlement by not turning over the keys. The lease had actually not terminated so I did not understand this. Told the police officer that I would contact him the next day. 

The police officer agreed but also decided to visit our home. At the time of his visit we were not home.

Our neighbors decided to inform the whole of Julianadorp by whatsapping that the police was after me.

March 1st I met up with the police officer and explained to him what a fraud Brewster is. 

This accompanied with evidentiary documents. The man was embarrassed but I find it unforgivable that he made a house call despite the fact that we already had agreed to meet the next day. 

I turned over the keys and asked the policeman to now go and jump in front of Brewster's house and ask for my ANG 100.00.-- and for reimbursement of the deposit on the rent. 

He stated that he will definitely not do that so once again the Curacao police is actively supporting a fraud and leaving victims out to fend for themselves.

On June 1st 2019 I received an email from Brewster stating: 

"IT'S ABOUT TIME TO SHOW YOU WITH WHOM YOU'RE DEALING WITH LITTLE MAN."

Somewhat to my dismay on June 17, 2019 we were informed by MCB Bank that Brewster still has debts mounting to some ANG 87.500 with them. Meaning that probably also this auction will not bring us any well deserved income. The auction will however go through. Or may be not. Brewster filed a law suit against us to prevent the auction. The bailiff summoned us on Wednesday, June 26th to appear in court on Friday June, 28 2019. It was a very short trial as the judge was also scheduled to preside over a divorce case so we were in court for 15 minutes. The basic stance of Brewster's lawyer was that we carry a grudge against Brewster. Further he remarked that we will not gain anything from auctioning off her home.

The judge ruled that for now Brewster can keep her home but needs to pay a monthly amount to us. If she does not pay we actually can auction of the house.

This verdict makes that for the coming 12 years or so we will still have to remain in contact with Brewster.

Of course Brewster followed up with an email stating what stupid losers we are. Whereas she now has to monthly cough up huge amounts to live in let's say not the best of neighborhoods.

I am honestly not looking forward to having to remain into contact with her.

The last days we received emails from her stating that I have small genitals, am unable to reproduce and have bad breath.

Brewster followed up by not paying in accordance with the verdict in the month of July, not in the month of August and a lesser amount then ruled by the judge and a day late in September. However, this is the first payment we directly received from her. Maybe my threat to file for her bankruptcy had something to do with that.

On November 6, 2019 Brewster's home and offices were raided by a special branch of police. A branch that has a focus on crimes within the kingdom and related mostly to politicians and high-ranking civil servants.

Above a clipping in local newspaper in our own language. You can however recognize Brewster's home from the google pic earlier in this blog.

And in Dutch:

Where I wrote "2017" on this newspaper clipping it should of course be "2019". My mistake.

As I understand it Brewster is now under suspicion of having forged court verdicts or documents presented to the court. As soon as we know in more detail what she is being accused of we shall of course inform you.

We noticed that Mrs. Brewster has acquired a new vehicle for her personal transportation. It is not an Audi anymore but from a Chinese car maker.

In the mean time Covid-19 has hit the world. As mentioned Brewster has ordered by a judge to monthly make a payment to us. This month no payment. After some emailing we received an email message from her lawyer Roy Bottse that due to Covid-19 Brewster will pay half the amount as she was ordered to by the judge. We do not agree but also this lesser amount has so far not been paid by Brewster so our case where we are auctioning of her beloved house in Suffisant has become stronger once again. Brewster obviously does not want to loose this house. So she paid 2 days overdue. 

For the life of me I do not understand how we came to auction of the house in posh Zuurzak where she fights like a lion for a house in a neighborhood where surely you will not find an other tax lawyer.

On August 21, 2020 I received an email from lawyer Roy Bottse stating that he possesses an email of me in which I write that our politicians are monkeys thus painting me to be a racist. 

A racist I am not and such email does not exist.

So he and/or Brewster must have forged an email and is now blackmailing me with that email. He basically wants me to do away with this blog or else expose me as a racist.

During our many court cases he gave a lot of evidence. Mostly of the fact that he has no grasp of the law.

Also  the above is proof of a total absence of integrity;  trying to blackmail me with a falsified email. He ought to be jailed on the spot.

On September 16, 2020 we received a report from a renowned forensic expert that mentioned email had indeed been falsified.

Roy Bottse knowingly tried to jeopardize me and my family by threatening to expose me as a racist which I am not. This shows that the man has no scruples whatsoever. Or better put; he has the moral compass of a dead shrimp.

It also shows a total lack of intelligence as this will now backfire. 

It took me three weeks to deliver proof that the email was pure forgery but he is now cowardly not communicating. 

End of the day these two shall not be prosecuted for forgery but they have been detained by the police -dragged out of their homes actually- and Brewster has admitted to having committed the forgery of an email once sent to her by me.

Roy Bottse claimed that he did not know that the e-mail was forged by Brewster.

How one is to keep ones humanity while dealing with these psychopaths is a question that for me keeps popping up.

In the mean time I am actually quite content with losing the court case where we were sentenced not to auction off Mrs. Brewster's home. The current legal interest rate is rather steep so within every year of payments three monthly installments bring interest and do therefore not redeem her debt. It is therefore that her debt is but very slowly decreasing.

On a more happy note. I realize that the above must come across as a total sob story. Still enjoying life though.

Here a picture of me playing golf:

On January 12, 2021 my wife showed me a Facebook post of a new political party called Partido KAS. Brewster is placed third on the list so she stands a good chance of becoming a Curacao politician. You may agree -having read this entire blog- that that is a scary thought. We shall commence some actions to prevent this from happening of course.

Here a picture of the electorate of mentioned political party. You may find Brewster fourth from the left. The one with the bleached hair.

Today (January 21, 2021) we received information that Brewster is no longer on this political party's list so she is no longer eligible to possibly represent the people in Curacao in parliament. Very glad about that.

Later that day we spotted the dream home that we auctioned off on the website of a Curacao realtor. The asking price was over 1.1 million guilders. Brewster still lives in her house in Suffisant. As mentioned before not the best of neighborhoods and her house has a value of less than 1 hundred thousand guilders.

Just read a post on Linkedin that the managing partner of Hertoghs, Mr. Kerckhoffs, is stepping down to become a prosecutor. Kerckhoffs in the footsteps of the late Mr. Hertoghs is an expert on tax crime and fraud and he shall be a great asset to the Dutch prosecutors.

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6859501246169063425/

I do hope however that Mr. Kerckhoffs stepping down from Hertoghs will not give room for Mr. Vos to -now for the third time- to run a law firm into the ground.

As I am writing this it is August 2022. Glad to say that I have not heard from Roy Bottse nor Judith Brewster since they tried to blackmail me in August 2020. Brewster is faithfully paying up every month. It will take her forever to redeem her debt as monthly installment is so low that she needs three of them just to cover legal interest. 

Grateful to say that over 1 hundred thousand readers have found this blog and my intention is to keep it alive until the moment that all wrongdoers like Judith Brewster, Roy Bottse, Taxand, Vos etc. have found a way to make compensation.

Went to the Netherlands and was informed by colleagues there that this blog is being well read in their community of (tax)lawyers.

Some 2 years ago I took up my old hobby of photography. Hereunder a picture that I took from a friend's balcony in Amsterdam.

It is my belief that Judith Brewster, Roelof Vos and lawyer Roy Bottse are total psychopaths.

They will all remain mentioned on the internet for all eternity.

This is also probably a good moment to mention that Judith Brewster and Roelof Vos proudly mentioned to me that they are of faith and go to church on a regular basis.

Amen to that.

Lawyer Roy Bottse is now getting upset about this blog. I received an email from him in which he states that he is a lawyer and that he was just doing his job. 

This shows that he seems to think that for a lawyer blackmailing the opponent with a forged email is a normal approach to solving matters in a legally sound way. 

That strengthens my opinion of his metal state as described above.

 

Even after proof was delivered that the email was actually forged it never crossed his mind to apologize for his actions.

Subsequently I received a letter from him on October 26th, 2022 that stated that I should remove all defamatory remarks about him like among other calling him a psychopath. And if not he would take me to court. That is surely something I do not want as I have no desire to meet this man again. So I will stop calling him a psychopath. In the future I will only think it. But here is the thing; this blog is solely based on facts and my opinions. And my opinions are fact based. As mentioned Mr. Bottse tried to blackmail me. That is a fact. That in hindsight he does not appreciate that I expose his actions is his problem.

The court case was supposed to take place on November 11, 2022 but after having received my input Bottse immediately asked the court for a postponement. The court case subsequently took place on December 5, 2022. A very amicable judge sort of coerced us in a compromise much to the dismay of Mr. Bottse who seemed to think that on his part no wrong-doing had taken place. I agreed to remove his not so flattering picture anyway from this blog and also a reference to his mental state in a sentence where I contemplate on my humanity.

I think the court case gave however further proof of how I described his mental state because when being asked if he could grasp what his actions had meant to me he started shouting things about me.

Self reflection is simply not there in the troubled mind of Mr. Bottse. Also absent is the willingness to pay the price of his wrongdoings. If you want to play these little jokes be prepared for some retaliation.

Further when we concluded our dealings in court he realized that he did not bring enough grievances before the judge thus giving proof once again how poor a lawyer he is; unable to even to bring his own case to a good ending.

Did not work (much) during the first week of 2023. It started off interestingly enough though as I just found out the legal interest for the first half year is set at a whopping 6.75 percent. For Brewster this means that about half of her monthly payments will be booked as interest and will therefore not redeem her debt.

The legal interest for the second half year of 2023 has increased again; it now is at 7.5 percent. Brewster seems to have become a rather sound investment.

There seems to be some movement in the criminal case against Brewster that started with her home and offices being raided in November 2019. You have to scroll back to read about that. It seems that Brewster had her day in court in the second week of November during which she denied all allegations. It is a fact however that forgery for Brewster is the normal way of doing business. She has forged power of attorneys on behalf of her sister and do remember that she also forged an email that made me appear to be a racist.

This clipping was sent to me this Friday morning November 10:

Brewster was convicted for forging court verdicts and for forging a bailiff's writ. She forged the verdicts obviously in such a way that she pretended to have won cases for her clients to charge extra or something like that.

The verdict is 4 months probational and 80 hours of community service with an operational period of 3 years.

BREAKING NEWS

On Friday April 5th 2024 I have taken the decision to follow-up again on going after Brewster to pay the money she owes to Taxand (TC B.V.). If you scroll back you may read that I was temporary director of the company for three years ending in November 2017. During that time I transferred the claims on Brewster to our third parties foundation thus ensuring that after my tenure as director of TC B.V. I would still be able to claim the amounts owed by Brewster. So on this April 5th 2024 we have taken the first step to probably take her to court once again. We have delivered a demand note to the bailiff who will on his turn deliver his writ to her. We have given her 10 days to either pay up or provide for a solution with regard to her debt which is roughly ANG 700 thousand (roughly USD 388 thousand). We shall probably see her in court again.

Thank you for reading this blog. Everyday I am amazed of the amount of readers of this blog and the outpour of support. On the other hand the last 12 years I have also learned that when you are perceived as being defeated hyenas may come running. The whole experience has definitely changed my perspective on life and on a lot my fellow human beings.

As always, will keep you posted!

Curaçao, April 2024!