This is the story of how a statuesque beauty who stood up against political corruption in a relatively newly independent Trinidad and Tobago ended up a wandering drunk of Port of Spain, Trinidad.
Gene Miles who became known as “Gas Station Gene” when she blew the whistle on her boss, Senior Factory Inspector in the Petroleum Ministry, Kenneth Tam and the Minister of Petroleum and Mines, Johnny O’Halloran, with whom she was linked romantically.
Many labeled her “a jilted lover” instead of taking her evidence seriously. Not only did she end up losing her job, but her good name, and died of a heart attack at just 42 years old.
For six days in July 1966, Miles took the witness stand in a Commission of Enquiry, telling them that Tam, who was then slated to go to person for gas station licenses, was using his monopoly to turn down applicants for the licenses. He would then use inside information about the land for which the license was requested to buy and then sell it to the same gas station vendors at more profitable prices.
In the end, Miles was given a bad report by the supposedly independent Public Service Commission, and eventually fired.
A vicious slander campaign was mounted against her and while she never became a vagrant, she was often seen wandering Port of Spain, bedraggled and drunk until her death on December 9th 1972.
O’ Halloran was charged for taking bribes in a petroleum deal in 1983 and fled to Canada where he died a millionaire two years later.
Gene’s boldness may have been inspired by her father Ranny Miles, who busted the biggest scam of the 1940 colonial days; the Caura Dam racket.(Leah Skeete)
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