Nandlall moves to enforce $37M judgement against ‘Melly Mel’ in US

Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, on Tuesday night informed that he will be initiating legal proceedings in the US to enforce a $37 million judgement that was awarded to him against social media influencer, US-based Guyanese Melissa Atwell-Holder, popularly known as “Melly Mel”.

In August, Nandlall had received a default judgment against Atwell-Holder in a civil libel proceeding he had filed against her in the High Court.

“This judgement will be transmitted to my team of lawyers in the United States of America with firm instructions from me that the judgment be registered and be enforced in the United States of America. Guyana’s judgment is equally enforceable as any judgement obtained in the United States of America,” Nandalall related in the latest episode of his weekly show “Issues in the News” .

“This must be a learning experience for all of us who believe that we can be in a foreign country and do what we like, say what we like and libel people as we wish and we are somehow immunised and insulated from the laws of this land. Guyana is part of the modern world and there is no legal system in the modern world that is so incapable of protecting the rights and freedoms of the people who live in that society.”

Notwithstanding being sued and losing judgements in several civil court matters in Guyana and the US, Atwell-Holder has repeatedly taken to her social media boasting about being untouchable given that she lives in the US, and says she has no assets which could be levied for payment.

Nandlall noted that even if Atwell-Holder has no assets upon which a writ of execution could be enforced, filing proceedings to have the judgment enforced is a matter of principle, as Atwell-Holder cannot be allowed to continue her disrespect of the judicial system with such impunity, and believing that there are no consequences to her actions.

“I always say that the law may be slow but law is not an ass. The arms of the law are very long… I don’t necessarily want anything from it. The lawyers from America will take their pay. Even if we have to get $1 per day, they will get it because the law must never be allowed to appear incapable and impotent to address an illegality,” Nandlall said.

“She will come out and say she doesn’t have a cent in her name and doesn’t own any property in her name. And that may be so but this judgment will ensure it remains like that because any cent that goes into her bank account or anywhere that she has money or property, this judgment will be enforced against that money or that property.”

Besides the $37 million awarded to Nandlall, in September, Atwell-Holder lost another case against the Balwant Singh Hospital and saw a judgement of $35 million awarded. She has since appealed that judgment.

Also in September, in the US, a federal judge in Brooklyn ruled against Atwell-Holder and dismissed a multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuit that she had brought against her rival social media personality, Rhonda Bobb. Minister of Public Utilities and Aviation, Deodat Indar also currently has a $50 million suit against her in the High Court.