Vybz Kartel, Co-Accused Freed, Will Not Face Retrial
Dancehall artist Vybz Kartel and his co-accused Shawn ‘Storm’ Campbell, Kahira Jones, and Andre St. John will not face a new trial for the murder of Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams, the Court Of Appeal has ruled in a unanimous decision.
On Wednesday, Justice Marva McDonald-Bishop, who leads the three-judge panel with Paulette Williams and David Fraser, announced that their decision was based on 12 factors. The Justice said that while the seriousness and prevalence of the crime weighed in favor of a retrial, there were “several, equally powerful factors, which, when combined, militate against ordering a new trial.”
These included:
- “the insufficient and inadequate account by the prosecution for the availability of its witnesses and trial exhibits”
- “…the time, financial costs, expense and impact on the Court’s resources as well as other cases in the queue awaiting trial. We find that this is significant and it militates against a new trial”
- “the psychological, financial and medical effect that a new trial would likely have on the appellants”
- “the unjustifiable interference with the appellants’ constitutional rights to a fair hearing within a reasonable time”
“Having regard to all considerations the court has taken into account, we conclude that the interest of justice do not require a new trial to be ordered for the appellants, and we therefore make the following order: judgments and verdicts of acquittal are entered in relation to the appellants,” the Justice concluded in a summary of the decision.
McDonald-Bishold thanked court staff, the defense, and the prosecution before adding, “That is it. The appellants are free.”
Kahira Jones will remain in custody because he is serving a sentence in an unrelated case.
The full judgment will be made available at www.courtofappeal.gov.jm.
Kartel and his co-accused, who have served over 12 years in prison, have consistently denied involvement in Williams’ death.
Prosecutors had relied on telecommunication evidence — including a text message stating that Williams, whose body was never found, had been “chopped up fine fine” — and the sole eyewitness, Lamar “Wee” Chow, who testified that Williams was murdered at Kartel’s home in Havendale, St Andrew on August 16, 2011, after they were summoned there over missing guns. After a 64-day trial in the Kingston Home Circuit Court, the longest in Jamaica’s history, the men were found guilty and sentenced to life in prison in April 2014. Kartel and St John received 35 years and 30 years minimum, respectively, while Campbell and Jones each received 25 years minimum.
Subsequently, in April 2020, the Court Of Appeal upheld the convictions but reduced their parole eligibility by two and a half years each.
They were then allowed to appeal to the UK-based Privy Council on the grounds that the telecommunication evidence was improperly obtained, that the jury was tainted after a bribery attempt, and that the original trial judge, Justice Lennox Campbell, placed undue pressure on the jury to reach a verdict.
In March this year, the Privy Council overturned the convictions after it found that Justice Campbell erred when he let a juror, accused of attempted bribery, participate in the final deliberations and verdict. They said this compromised the safety of the convictions and violated the appellants’ right to a fair trial.
However, the UK-based court did not release the men. Instead, it remitted the case back to the Court of Appeal to determine whether Kartel and his co-accused ought to be retried.
In its verdict, the Privy Council noted that it did not rule on the admissibility of cellular evidence nor the claims of jury pressure.
Kartel, whose real name is Adidja Palmer, has been experiencing poor health while in prison, including an autoimmune disorder known as Graves’ disease and two heart conditions, according to his lawyer Isat Buchanan.