The DPP said he intended to look at the findings of the ongoing police inquiry into the Corporation's financial affairs, once the Lagoon Park murder trial had concluded.

His comments come in the week before the second anniversary of the day the blew open the BHC scandal.

It was on March 8, 2002, that we stunned the island with the headline "Bermuda's Enron" ? referring to a comment made by Opposition Housing Minister Michael Dunkley on the floor of the House of Assembly days earlier, as he made claims of corruption in the BHC.

The story revealed massive payments of public money to a painting contractor whose wife was a close of the Premier of the time, Jennifer Smith.

In the 24 months since, neither the Government nor the BHC has made any statement explaining those payments.

Since then more revelations of mismanagement have been made against the Government-run quango. And the police inquiry is understood to be looking into the affairs of past and present members of the Government.

Mr. Ratneser said yesterday: "The murder trial is in court right now and until I finish that case I don't think I will have any time to look at the BHC matter ? maybe in the next couple of weeks.

"I have been looking at this matter for a long time and nothing has been finalised. It's not something that can be taken lightly and I have to give it my full attention and I intend to do that soon."

A police inquiry into the Corporation's financial affairs has been going on for the past 21 months, involving a team of seven officers helped on occasion by Fraud Squad detectives from Scotland Yard, as well as an accountant from the Office of the Auditor General on full-time secondment. The painter in our story, Paul Young, who later earned the sobriquet 'The Man With the Golden Paintbrush', eventually broke his silence through the , saying that the payments were justified, though he declined to explain why he was paid more than $0.8 million in the space of seven months.

We published BHC documents showing that Mr. Young had been paid $810,940 by the Corporation between May and November in 2001.

An experienced painting contractor said when he heard of the numbers: "That figure is preposterous! You could paint the whole island for that! That amount of money could not have been just for painting."

We also showed that gardener Caven Richardson ? who later revealed he worked alone ? received $68,564 inside 12 weeks from the BHC.

The story sparked a remarkable chain of events including an official examination of the BHC accounts, what is believed to be the biggest police fraud investigation the island has ever seen, the sacking of BHC general manager Raymonde Dill and the creation of a new Ministry of Housing, a move which meant the then-Health Minister Nelson Bascome was relieved of his housing portfolio.

Here we take a look back at some of the principal events in the ongoing story of the BHC scandal.

Last March, then-Premier Jennifer Smith ordered an in-depth investigation to be carried out by Auditor General Larry Dennis and soon afterwards BHC general manager Raymonde Dill was suspended.

More emerged about painter Mr. Young. His wife Dale Place Young was shown to be a close friend of the Premier.

Mr. Young himself, an American, had been on the Bermuda Stop List and was thereby prevented from coming to the island until the bar was lifted the month after the Progressive Labour Party was voted into power.

l BHC property officer Terrance Smith was shown to be running a freelance architectural design company from his desk.

Meanwhile, Planning Department official Austin Simons admitted doing construction work on Mr. Smith's sprawling Tee Street house ? work that did not have planning permission at the time.

Mr. Simons resigned, while Mr. Smith and Mr. Dill were both fired by the BHC in August 2002.

Mr. Dennis' report was completed in May 2002 and it sparked a police investigation by the Commercial Crime Unit. Two senior British police officers came over from Scotland Yard to help with the inquiry and Police Commissioner Jonathan Smith has since promised that "nothing will be swept under the carpet".

Mr. Dill then decided to have his say, in an interview with the , in which he accused Health & Family Services Minister Nelson Bascome of breaking BHC rules. The former BHC general manager said Mr. Bascome had allocated a $300,000 landscaping contract to a company that had not even submitted a bid.

The Premier spoke to Mr. Bascome about the issue and though a statement on the matter was promised from Premier Smith, no such statement was ever made.

Mr. Bascome, who denied having done anything wrong, was relieved of the housing portfolio in a Cabinet reshuffle, but retained his position as Health Minister.

In October 2002, Senator David Burch took over as Housing Minister and in a press conference, he conceded that contractors had indeed been overpaid by the BHC. And he added that Government intended to sue the overcharging contractors. No contractors have since been sued for overcharging.

In November 2002, the made another remarkable revelation ? that the BHC had paid a contractor $4.2 million for building 12 new condos ? at around twice the going rate, according to one experienced builder. We cited BHC documents which showed that Hibiscus Development Ltd. was paid $4,197,518.20 by the Corporation for work on the Perryville complex in Warwick. The founding partners of Hibiscus are listed as Kevin Bean-Walls and Leon James Williams and we proved that they were also behind another company that was awarded the contract for the multi-million-dollar BHC development at Southside.

In January 2003, it was again this newspaper which revealed the news that former BHC general manager Raymonde Dill had been arrested and questioned by police in connection with the BHC inquiry before being released on police bail.

In February last year, former BHC property officer Terrance Smith was arrested and questioned in connection with the BHC probe. And the DPP successfully applied for an order restricting Mr. Smith from selling his Tee Street property.

In July last year, obtained a copy of Mr. Dennis' BHC report and published its findings. Mr. Dennis' team found that two Government MPs had been heavily involved in dealings with the Corporation without disclosing their interests; contractors got away with double-billing and charging what they liked, sometimes double the amounts quoted for jobs; loans were given to clients and BHC officials without being secured or given ministerial permission; policies and procedures were blatantly ignored; and the responsibilities of the board had virtually been abolished.

An internal PLP rebellion after the party's General Election victory last July saw Alex Scott replace Jennifer Smith as Premier. Neither Mr. Bascome nor Sen. Burch was included in Mr. Scott's first Cabinet.

In his annual report last November, Auditor General Mr. Dennis said the former management of the BHC "manipulated and out-manoeuvred" a board that failed to perform its duty.

No financial statement of the Bermuda Housing Corporation has been presented to the House of Assembly since 2001. In failing to deliver those statements, the Ministry of Housing has broken the law.

Only when the police investigation and possible consequent court proceedings are completed will the public really get to know the full story of what really happened at the BHC.