Vybz Kartel’s Defence Team Moves Aggressively To Prove Evidence “Tampering”

Vybz Kartel’s defence team is now trying to gain access to ‘Exhibit 14C’, the cellphone which contained controversial voice notes allegedly recorded by one of the accused.

Isat Buchanan, who is now representing incarcerated dancehall artiste Vybz Kartel, told DancehallMag that the defence team had been stymied in their attempts to gain access to the phone by the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

“We have represented our concerns by writing to agents in England, and we hope that this activity will move the Privy Council to force the DPP’s hand to release the phone so we can confirm whether it was tampered with. We believe that there is evidence of tampering,” Buchanan said.

VOICE notes laced with expletives and death threats, which are believed to be from an accused in the Vybz Kartel murder trial, were leaked to the public years ago after they were played for jurors in the Home Circuit Court.

In some of the voice notes, dated August 14, 2011, the sender said that he was informed that his two “new shoes” were missing and that the guilty party would be killed if the “shoes” were not returned by eight o’clock that evening.

The damning voicenote, one of several which has been leaked to the public, since the time of the trial said:

“…a weh me tell you hombre, di man weh dem gi di [expletive deleted] shoes fi lock, if eight o’clock come an mi nuh get mi shoes a di same [expletive deleted] ting dawg… suh if dem waa dem fren fi live dem betta get mi [expletive deleted] shoes…,”

The prosecution had tendered into evidence, one iPhone and three BlackBerry cell phones, during the initial trial. The jurors heard nine voice notes, among a total of 40 voice notes “of interest” that were on cellphones confiscated by the police during their investigation of Williams’ murder.

Buchanan had argued before the Court of Appeal that not only was the phone evidence compromised, resulting in disjointed and incomplete messages being presented to the court, but there were also inconsistent times given regarding the creation date for the damning text and the file in which it was created.

Defence attorneys have long contended that Justice Lennox Campbell erred when he allowed “contaminated exhibits” into evidence, which ultimately sealed their clients’ fate. The ‘contaminated exhibits’ include text messages, voice notes and video recordings lifted from Kartel’s cell phone into evidence, which they believe prejudiced the case against the four accused men.

The defence lawyers also blame the police for altering the phone’s data and possibly concocting the damning message that was sent from Adidja ‘Vybz Kartel’ Palmer’s phone.

The text, which read: “Between me and you a chop wi chop up di bwoy Lizard fine fine and dash him weh nuh. As long as wi a live dem can never find him”, according to the prosecution, should be construed as an admission of guilt.

In the meantime, Vybz Kartel and his co-accused were granted leave in September to take their case before the Privy Council in the UK.