Appeal Court upholds SOCU’s power to seize gold, cash in money laundering case

The Court of Appeal has dismissed the move by a Brazilian gold dealer and his company to challenge the Special Organised Crime Unit’s (SOCU) authority to seize over $162 million in gold and cash linked to an ongoing money laundering case.

The Court of Appeal’s ruling, handed down Monday by Justices Jo-Ann Barlow, Dawn Gregory, and Rafiq Khan S.C., was in relation to a case brought by Sebastiao De Oliveira Moura and Moura Gago Gold Inc.

The ruling concerned whether SOCU, as an unincorporated statutory body, has the legal standing to bring proceedings under the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Act (AML/CFT Act). The court ruled unequivocally that it does, finding that the applicants had no realistic prospect of success on appeal.

“Formal incorporation is not required. Parliament has, by necessary implications arising from its statutory function, conferred the requisite legal standing,” the Court ruling noted.

At the centre of this case are 4,018.15 pennyweights of gold valued at approximately $80.9 million and cash totalling $81.1 million, belonging to De Oliveira Moura and his company, GAGO Gold Inc. The properties were first detained in February 2024 following a joint operation involving SOCU, the Ministry of Natural Resources, the Guyana Gold Board, and the Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC).

Then-Chief Justice Roxane George had ordered the properties released on April 3, 2025 — prompting SOCU to file five criminal counts of money laundering against De Oliveira Moura the very next day. Then, after the properties were returned to the respondents in late November 2025 pursuant to another court order, SOCU promptly re-seized them and returned to court seeking a fresh detention order.

Then came a ruling from Acting Chief Justice Navindra Singh, who granted that detention order on March 23, 2026, rejecting defence arguments led by attorneys Latchmie Rahamat and Naresh Poonai. Justice Singh found that the earlier release of the properties by Chief Justice George did not amount to a ruling that the assets were clean but that they were to be physically returned.

“The fact is, the property was physically returned as ordered by the Court,” Chief Justice Singh was quoted as saying in a SOCU release. “In ordering the release of the property, Chief Justice George did not make a finding or adjudicate on whether or not the property was tainted property. There being no such adjudication with respect to the property, the Applicant is entitled to seize the property under section 37A of the AML/CFT Act.”

The Chief Justice further found that SOCU had put forward convincing evidence of reasonable grounds for the seizure, and that the respondents had raised no viable defence to the detention application. SOCU was also awarded costs of G$500,000, payable by April 23, 2026.

After that, the respondents pushed further, seeking leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal on a fundamental question — whether SOCU, lacking formal corporate incorporation, has the legal capacity to institute proceedings under the AML/CFT Act at all. The Full Court had previously addressed this question and ruled in SOCU’s favour, finding the issue to be of significant public importance even after the underlying matter was abandoned.

With this legal hurdle resolved, there still remain the criminal money laundering charges against De Oliveira Moura before the Magistrate’s Court. However, the gold and cash will remain in state custody as that case continues.