_( 41. However, the defendant seeks to find a legal basis for withholding plaintiff's money by relying on the letter written to the Executive Governor of the Central Bank withdrawing the request for the release of plaintiff's funds. The said lette r stated that plaintiff's funds should not be released pending further investigations into the matter. Defendant argued that the letter asking for the release of plaintiff's funds was written based on misrepresentations made by one of the lawyers of the plaintiff in Liberia. However, defendant failed to name which lawyer made those misrepresentations, neither did she tender the said statement as evidence in this proceeding. The Court cannot accept oral statements made by the defendant without further proof as to its veracity. 42. Further, the letter in question was written on January 24, 2009 whilst the present action was instituted on April 8, 2011. Thus, this action was commenced over two clear years from the date which the defendant indicated that she wanted to further investigate the issue but she placed nothing on record to show the Court that indeed some further investigations have been conducted into the issue. And even if they did conduct further investigations, there is no evidence anything adverse to the plaintiff was found. The court will thus conclude that no crime was found against the plaintiff from the day of his arrest to date. 43. It is important to note that the plaintiff was divested of his money on September 9, 2006. It thus took the defendant over two years to conclude investigations and recommend the release of plaintiff's funds. Thus, defendant had over four years to investigate this issue before plaintiff commenced this action. The fact that the defendant had not been able to find evidence to support the charge preferred against the plaintiff in four years coupled with the fact that her officials had succinctly stated that plaintiff was not guilty of the charges preferred against him leads the Court to the irresistible conclusion that the plaintiff is not indeed guilty of the charge preferred against him. The defendant therefore has no legal justification to withhold plaintiff's money. 44. The Court must place it on record that member states have a duty to expedite investigations when they confiscate money based on reasonable suspicion that strangers entering their territory are carrying money for criminal purposes, or the 16