Invoice spotlighted in Ruel Reid and co trial

THE prosecution and defence attorneys clashed on Wednesday about whether an invoice concerning the purchase of eyeglasses should be allowed into evidence in the ongoing fraud trial of former Education Minister Ruel Reid and his co-accused.

The invoice was brought up during the second day of testimony from a Corporate Area businesswoman who had told the court on Tuesday that the former minister of education had purchased two pairs of frames and corresponding lenses from her eye clinic on August 15, 2018.

Recalling the 2018 purchase during examination in chief, the witness said that after a discount which took the total to $110,000 and around $16,000 in health insurance deductions, she remembered charging Reid around $92,000 for the glasses, but added that the exact amounts would have been recorded on an invoice generated by the systems used at the clinic.