A local retail chain was on the verge of collapse before an overseas worker came on board to rescue it, an accountant charged yesterday.

Colin Clive Andrew Cave made the claim as he testified for the first time in Supreme Court.

Cave faces 36 counts of stealing more than $54,000 from his employer and creating false accounts for the two holding companies of Davison's of Bermuda.

Cave told the nine-woman, three-man jury he was surprised by the disarray he found in the local company's finances.

"If I would have known the state of affairs of the company before coming here, I would not have come here,'' said the 49-year-old.

"In all my life, even in the Eastern Bloc countries, I have never seen such a mess. Nothing worked. Nothing.

"I came to Norman (Davison) and said, `Well, at least your sales are pretty good, you've got $10 million in sales'.

"But he told me, on his best bet, sales would only be $5 million, it was a real mess.

"It was in a worse position than the Titanic .'' Cave, who described himself as a "pretty good international business man'', said he had worked at different companies in the Caribbean, Europe and North America before coming to Bermuda in 1995.

And he told defence attorney Mark Petingill he had worked at the executive management level of various companies since 1981.

Cave also said he regarded his authority in Davison's as equal to that of a vice-president of finances.

"Norman had no vice-president of marketing or operations,'' he said.

"My responsibility was basically to run the company with the intention, in one year's time, to set up a head office somewhere in the US.'' "My excitement was not about the salary,'' he continued. "It was a great opportunity...an older gentleman who was retiring, his family wasn't interested in the company, he wanted to enjoy fishing in South America.

"And I would, in effect, be running the show as president of the company.'' Cave also denied Mr. Davison's earlier trial testimony that the financial controller's 1995 business trip had been unauthorised.

"We had discussed, before my trip, all of Norman's concerns and what he wanted me to accomplish, and some of them were very pressing issues,'' said Cave.

And he submitted a full report of the trip immediately upon his return, he claimed.

He also suggested the company's auditors had provided only selective, incriminating sections of financial records.

"They're only showing one side of it,'' Cave said. "They never looked at the bank statements, or, if they did, they never submitted them.'' Cave said GES Ltd., Mr. Davison's separate lumber and kitchen cabinet supply company, made loans of tens of thousands of dollars to Davison's of Bermuda.

"Contrary to what you heard from Norman (Davison) and William (Nicholson), there was a lot of intercompany interaction,'' he said.

He added that he had received permission to use BVH accounts to hold personal payments from an overseas company with which he was involved.

"I asked if I could put money in BVH Ltd.,'' Cave explained, " ... then take it out at my convenience since Bermuda was a tax haven and I would not have to pay any taxes on it since I was now a resident in Bermuda.'' Cave said he often made the personal funds available to cover shortages in the office's petty cash or store's till drawers.

The case continues today before Justice Richard Ground. Peter Eccles and Charlene Scott represent the Crown.