Controversial musician Vybz Kartel allegedly drove fear into a female juror who was as a result discharged from the case, according to a prosecutor.
The senior deputy director of public prosecutions, Jeremy Taylor, claimed that Vybz Kartel approached the son of a female member of the jury in prison and said something to him. The female juror told the judge about her concerns and asked to be relieved from jury duty, to which the judge complied and sent her home.
During his arguments in the Court of Appeal last week, the lawyers argued that the judge and the prosecution breached his client’s constitutional right to a fair trial when they discharged the juror from the 2014 murder trial.
One of the prosecutors in Vybz Kartel‘s case, Orrett Brown, says the controversial chop up “fine fine” text message was sent three days after the murder of Clive “Lizard” Williams. Defense attorneys and prosecutors row in court earlier this week over the validity of a text message sent from a Blackberry smartphone seized from Kartel where he admitted to killing Clive “Lizard” Williams.
According to the defense, Williams was killed on August 16, 2011, but the text message lifted from the Blackberry was sent six weeks before that date. Assistant Director of Public Prosecution, Orrett Brown, told the Court of Appeal that the defense attorneys statement on the validity of the text message is a “misapprehension of the evidence.”
Brown told the court that it was that file containing the text message evidence that was created six weeks before the murder. However, the text itself was sent from the phone three days after the gruesome murder of Clive Williams. Let’s not forget that Williams’ body was never found.
“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,” the text message reads.
There was another text message that was sent out by the cell phone after it was taken from Vybz Kartel. Brown says investigators likely sent that message to find out the phone number of the sim card. He said this is a standard procedure used by law enforcement especially in a case where a phone is locked.
Regarding four phone calls that were made by said phone while it’s in police custody, Brown could not offer up an explanation for those calls. Defense attorneys contend that the cell phone was tampered with by police officers and evidence was fabricated to secure a conviction.
The Court of Appeal judges are now deliberately the case.
On 29 September 2011, Kartel was arrested by police for marijuana possession. Jamaica’s Major Investigation Taskforce (MIT) later charged him with the murder of a Jamaican businessman, Barrington Burton, conspiracy to murder and illegal possession of a firearm.
While in prison in 2012, his book The Voice Of The Jamaican Ghetto: Incarcerated but not Silenced, co-written with business associate Michael Dawson, was published.
Though Kartel was granted bail for the Burton murder on 23 March 2012 for JD$3,000,000, he remained in jail in connection with a second murder, of one Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams, of Waterford, St Catherine. He was charged, along with two others including Vanessa “Gaza Slim” Saddler, with perverting the course of justice, after Saddler allegedly claimed that Williams had robbed her in order to mislead the police into believing that he was still alive. Kartel’s trial was originally scheduled for 21 January 2013, but had to be postponed due to a lack of jurors, and was rescheduled for 11 July.
On 24 July a jury found Kartel not guilty of the charge of murder of Barrington Burton. However, Kartel remained in custody pending the second murder case. His trial for the murder of Clive Williams started on 18 November 2013 and on 13 March 2014, he was found guilty by an eleven-member jury (10-1) of murder of 27-year-old Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams. The 65-day trial was said to have been the longest in Jamaica’s history.
On 3 April 2014, Kartel was sentenced to life imprisonment. Justice Lennox Campbell said he would be eligible for parole after serving 35 years