JOURNALIST Gary Eleazar who is under arrest in relation to an extortion case reportedly told investigators on Sunday that he was contacted by Dorwain Bess, who told him that a businessman was evading taxes on imported vehicles and he subsequently wrote an article on the matter.

The said article was then sent to Bess, who is a businessman, who then sent it to US-based social media commentator Rickford Burke, who added several paragraphs before it was then posted on the Guyana News Network Facebook page and website, Eleazar reportedly told investigators.

“Notably, he also said that he had access to the GNN website for over a year and was given the website’s password and username by Rickford Burke to manage the website, he subsequently uploaded about five articles to the site,” a release claimed.

The release also alleged that Eleazar said that he sent five articles targeting an individual and companies to Bess and Burke, who would then post the said articles to the GNN website and Facebook page.

In particular, he alleged that Bess had told him that the article in question was to threaten the businessman because of $ 100.000.000 that he had lost while they were in business. Burke in another section of the media has denied any association with the controversial post and online entity in question.

This publication on Sunday reported that Eleazar and another reporter, Alex Wayne, were arrested and are in police custody for allegedly extorting $1 million from a businessman to remove an offensive post published by the Guyana News Network , a “slanderous” online entity.

Police are continuing their investigations.