News Story

ARIZONA: NEW PEOPLE CORRESPONDNET: The tragedy happened on July 14 2002 when a ward of Kadiatu Kamara, fifteen year old Mohammed Kamara drowned during a field trip organized by the Living Water of the Valley Church in Phoenix. However, the church never asked the consent of Kadiatu Kamara to take the minor on the field trip. Madam Kamara promptly sued for wrongful death. On face value, it looked like an open and shut case. The services of attorneys William Howell and later M. Alieu Iscandari were secured. According to sources close to the case, the case was not very well presented and Kadiatu Kamara lost the case although the court awarded $250,000 compensatory judgment in favor of the plaintiff. It has been reliably learnt that even though the case was lost, that did not preclude Mr. M. Alieu Iscandari from showing footage of the case as a video montage during his birthday celebrations apparently without the consent of the plaintiff. Be that as it may, as of going to press, neither Mr. Iscandari nor Mr. Howell has given a single penny of the settlement money to Madam Kadiatu Kamara.

Initially, Mr. Alieu Iscandari was hired as an expert witness but he was later sent to Sierra Leone to get depositions from family members of the deceased child. After that, Mr. Iscandari became co-counsel in the case. Based on the copy of a letter dated March 8 2006, Mr. Howell informed Kadiatu Kamara of the $250,000 settlement but was quick to tell her she would only get $60,000 of the money. The attorney explained that the court awarded $250,000 but had cut it down to about $100,000. This reasoning is very strange as before a court announces an award, it would have factored in every thing and so when the award is made, nothing else is taken away by the court. Even with this, the lawyers have failed to date to pay Kadiatu Kamara her money. Sources close to Kadiatu Kamara intimate that the lawyers are only now willing to give her $8,000.

After seeing the letter, the New People investigated further and found out that outside the $250,000 awarded by the courts, there seems to have been other judgments in favor of Kadiatu Kamara to the tune of $100,500 which were not mentioned in the Attorney’s letter to Kadiatu Kamara. This judgment can be accessed at the Arizona Supreme Court at Maricopa. This has led to speculations that the lawyers may not have even told Kadiatu Kamara the whole truth about the total judgment awarded in her favor.

In addition, there seems to be cost inflation on the part of the attorney. Documents in the possession of New People show exorbitant prices for expert witness Mr. M. Alieu Iscandari. For instance, Mr. Iscandari claims to have paid $912.00 for a round trip ticket from NY to Arizona on January 25 2006. Bear in mind that January is a low traveling season. Another example is that Mr. M. Alieu Iscandari received $6,000 wired to him while in Sierra Leone, that is in addition to another $8,000 previously given to him when he was going to Sierra Leone. Further investigations reveal that between July and August 2005 when Mr. Iscandari received $12,000 for his expenses in Sierra Leone, he leased a house around Goderich area outside Freetown. The documents also reveal that Mr. M. Alieu Iscandari alone spent more than $20,000.

Kadiatu Kamara is yet to receive a dime of her money and she does not seem to be making any headway with the two lawyers. Sources claim that she is threatening to take the matter to the American Bar Association. This is indeed a double tragedy for Kadiatu Kamara.