Nadia Simpson
Friday, March 14, 2014
Popular Jamaican dancehall and reggae star Vybz Kartel also known as 'World Boss" in the dancehall music circles has been found guilty of murder. Kartel and three co-defendants were convicted under tight security of killing an associate, Clive Lizard Williams, over a missing gun.
Parts of the capital Kingston were cordoned off in advance of the verdict and police patrols were stepped up. The 11-member jury took just 2 hours in their deliberation before returning a 10:1 guilty verdict. Presiding judge Lennox Campbell initially sent them back to deliberate further in hopes that they will reach a unanimous verdict.
Shortly before the jury started to deliberate in the afternoon, about 200 people briefly broke through barricades at one intersection shouting "Free Kartel!"But the jury returned inside the court minutes later with said 10:1 deadlock.
The AP news agency says that in a bizarre twist to the case, a male juror was arrested on Thursday evening on charges of attempting to bribe the jury foreman to free Kartel.
“We will not sit by and let this case of injustice score victory,” a rep for the deejay stated. “We will be appealing the verdict given the many questionable police corruption issues in the case.”
Vybz Kartel, Shawn “Storm” Campbell, Kahira Jones, André St John were all found guilty, while co-accused Shane Williams was acquitted of the murder
Jamaican authorities stunned everyone when they swept down on a hotel in Kingston on September 30, 2011 and arrested Vybz Kartel and several other men.
When Kartel was arrested in 2011, it was alleged he had been involved in two killings, but one of those cases was thrown out last year after key evidence went missing.
Prosecutors said that Williams was beaten to death at Swallowfield Road in Havendale at a house believed to be owned by Vybz Kartel,
after being lured there to account for two missing illegal guns.
The prosecution, headed by attorney Jeremy Taylor, took 46 days and 24 witnesses to build its case against Kartel. The Crown argued that Vybz Kartel, his protege Shawn “Storm” Campbell, friends Kahira Jones, André St John, and Shane Williams all participated in the beating death Clive “Lizard” Williams over two missing firearms belonging to the deejay.
Clive Williams body has yet to be found.
To help make their case, the prosecution introduced several damning evidence including text messages, voice notes, Blackberry Messenger messages and video footage.
The Crown also had the help of an informant who says he accompanied Clive Williams to the house in Havendale on the day of his disappearance. The star witness, Llamar Chow, says he escaped from the house after seeing his friend lifeless body on the floor.
He told the court that he saw one of the accused men with a building block in his hand.
The defense maintained that the entire case was fabricated by the police force with the help of the informant to secure a high profile conviction.
Senior police officer Patrick Linton admitted in court that one of the Blackberry smartphones that police officers extracted data from was being used while it was in the custody of his department at the cyber crime unit.
The defense asked the judge to exclude the phone and its data from the evidence but presiding judge Lennox Campbell rejected the motion and accepted the incriminating data into evidence.
Presiding judge Lennox Campbell took six days to give the 11-member jury his summation of the lengthy murder trial.
Justice Campbell told the jury to not find the dancehall artiste guilty based on the content of his lyrics. But focus solely on the evidence presented by the prosecution.
The sentencing date is scheduled for 27 March.
Note: Nadia Simpson is an Entertainment Reporter with MNI Alive: Global Caribbean Media
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