Wealthy Italian Antonio Velardo calls Belize "extremely corrupt"

On Sunday April 28th, 35-year old Italian Antonio Velardo and 47-year-old Swedish boat captain, Levente Arangos were escorted out of Belize via their vessel La Aventura. This was after the Belize Immigration Department executed a notice forbidding the captain and the lone passenger permission to land after they were temporarily arrested and Velardo was charged for failure to declare funds. The two arrived in Belize and docked at a local marina in San Pedro Town on April 24th. After being in the country for 24 hours, authorities found a total of US$22,000 inside La Aventura which both men had failed to declare upon entry into Belize. A month after he was booted out of Belize for "failure to make a declaration", (failure to declare money) which he pleaded guilty to, Velardo spoke to The San Pedro Sun and said that there is more to the story than was told.

According to Velardo, because he had so many forms to fill out, he skipped one section which dealt with funds declaration, but it was unintentional. He said while he agreed that he unintentionally skipped a section on the form, he had enough proof that his money was not illegally gained. He said that while on his vessel, one of the law enforcement officers asked him if he had money in excess of $10,000US. "I replied to her that I had over $20,000 US. She said that on the form I did not declare having more money and because I had already signed the document, I had to be detained. I did sign the form; I had so many forms that at one point I was lost and confused. In addition, I had all these people around and was scared and having so many forms was uncomfortable for me and it was simply an oversight on my part. Now anyone with logical thinking will understand that someone like me has nothing to gain in not declaring that money - it was simply a mistake which I accepted. I travelled with that money because I want to ensure that in the case of emergency, such as a boat failure which would require cash to repair or if I ran out of fuel because of unforeseen circumstances, I want to make sure I have enough cash to pay. I have seen cases where I have attempted to pay by credit card and credit cards are not accepted, and then the next thing you know is that I am stuck in the middle of nowhere without cash. I don't want to be in a similar position. $22,000US was not a lot of money if you travel by boat. Fuel alone for one route amounts to over $5,000. That money is not a lot of money to have if for a person that travels from one point of the Caribbean to another," justified Velardo. He said that his intention was only to meet with investors and explore business opportunities while on the island.

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