[HPN] Jamaican homeless-dumping trial postponed: Justice denied or due deliberation? FWD deliberation? FWD

[Tom Boland]

What have we here?
Justice delayed and thus justice denied?
Or due deliberation?
I invite your comments.

http://newsfinder.arinet.com/fpweb/fp.dll/$stargeneral/htm/x_dv.htm/_ibyx/cg0302
6/_itox/starnet/_svc/news/_Id/641077802/_k/uMH51inUcK6byyfO
FWD  Asociated Press - AP Wire Service - Feb 22, 2000

     TRIAL IN JAMAICAN HOMELESS-DUMPING CASE POSTPHONED

PORT ANTONIO, Jamaica (AP) _ The trial of three men accused of
removing homeless people from a resort area and dumping them 50
miles (80 kilometers) inland has been postponed while a government
commission investigates the charges, local media reported Tuesday.

The three men _ Montego Bay police office Ainsworth Giddens,
truck driver Roger Leslie and garbage collector Egbert Campbell _
were charged with rounding up 32 homeless people, loading them onto
a truck and taking them to the outskirts of Santa Cruz, a small
town in the less touristy southwestern part of the island.

They were unloaded in a deserted area called Dump Land.

Some of the 32 homeless have said their hands were tied behind
their backs while they were on the truck to prevent them from
jumping off. All were returned to Montego Bay by the police shortly
after news of the incident last July broke.

Civil rights groups want further arrests, saying the three men
could not have organized the roundup independently of higher
authorities.

The trial of the three men was supposed to begin Monday.

But prosecutor Bryan Sykes told the court a conflict could arise
between prosecutors and a three-member government investigative
commission, and that delaying the trial ``would avoid a tug of war
between witnesses,'' the Daily Observer reported Tuesday. Prime
Minister P.J. Patterson appointed the commission earlier this
month.

``The inquiry itself may say that others may be charged, and
then we would have ended up with a multiplicity of trials,'' Sykes
said.

Defense attorneys did not oppose Sykes' motion and the judge
rescheduled the trial date for late May, the Observer said.

AP-CS-02-22-00 1735EST
Received  Id AP100053506D601E on Feb 22 2000 16:35

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