ROSEAU, Dominica, CMC – Senior Justice of the Peace Michael Laudat has withdrawn from a case by which a police officer has been charged with possession of medicine and ammunition, saying he doesn’t really feel assured that he might administer justice to the accused.
The Justice of the Peace was on account of hear arguments concerning bail for Constable Anthony Francis Jr., however introduced that he was recusing himself from the matter and positioned it earlier than the Chief Justice of the Peace, who will now take care of the bail software.
The matter has since been adjourned to Thursday.
Francis, who on the time of his arrest was stationed on the Mahaut Police Station on the island’s west coast, has been charged with the possession of 5 rounds of 12-gauge ammunition in addition to with possession of 20 rounds of seven.5 ammunition with out being the holder of a sound licence.
As well as, the policeman was charged with the theft of 121 rounds of various ammunition valued at EC$359 (One EC greenback=US$0.37 cents), and 286 grams of cocaine valued at EC$7,722, the property of the Dominica Police Pressure.
On his first court docket look on September 5, the police officer pleaded responsible to all three fees and was stored in custody pending one other court docket look three days later.
Nonetheless, within the firm of his lawyer, Tiyania Behanzin, who requested the court docket to re-read the costs to him, Francis Jr. pleaded “not responsible” to the costs, together with his lawyer then making a bail software on his behalf.
Behanzin informed the court docket that earlier than the alleged crime, his shopper had been “a mannequin police officer” and had two younger youngsters, was the only breadwinner of his household, and denying him bail was “not in the perfect curiosity of society”.
However the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Sherma Dalrymple, objected to bail, telling the court docket that the alleged offences have been “critical, given the offences charged, beneath the Bail Act, bail was ‘not a proper’ and “it was not within the public’s curiosity to so grant bail”.
She mentioned the prosecution supposed to name an “skilled witness” to testify on the caliber of the ammunition stolen and its efficiency now being within the palms of the general public.
Nonetheless, Behanzin objected, however his objection was overruled by the court docket, which said that the regulation permits the prosecution to name witnesses, in addition to the protection.
Laudat gave every occasion time to organize, file, and serve statements through affidavits and to return to court docket on Tuesday. Nonetheless, when the matter got here up for listening to, Behanzin knowledgeable the court docket that he confronted a number of challenges in submitting his shopper’s rebuttal and requested that he be allowed to handle the court docket on the matter. The court docket denied his request as a result of he had failed to stick to the court docket’s necessities.
After a short adjournment, the Justice of the Peace returned and defined that, given all that had transpired, he, as a minister of justice, didn’t really feel assured that he might administer justice to the accused and that he was recusing himself from the matter.
Francis was remanded on the State’s Jail pending his bail software.
