Latest update March 28th, 2024 12:59 AM
Jan 18, 2015 News
“The state is not paying Mr. Hughes, I am. I had to seek permission from the DPP to allow Mr. Hughes to prosecute for me. Now is it fair to me now that she should pick up somebody to send to prosecute a case that the person doesn’t know anything about?”
The mother of a miner who was beaten to death in the interior almost two years ago is surprised by the call by relatives of the men accused of killing him, to replace Special Prosecutor, Attorney at Law Nigel Hughes.
Barbara James, the mother of John Derwin McPherson, is convinced that the four accused are trying to derail the justice system by accusing Hughes of deliberately prolonging the Preliminary Inquiry into the April 2013 murder.
She claimed that the men should point fingers at their own Defence Attorney, who is engaged in other matters and who is constantly seeking time from the Magistrate to accommodate her tight schedule.
Vishnu Babu, Mohamed Razack, Chetram Diaram and Shawn Caesar have been on remand since April 2013, having been charged with the vigilante killing of McPherson at a mining camp at Oku Backdam, Cuyuni
Last Monday their relatives moved to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) in protest demanding that a new Prosecutor should preside in the preliminary inquiry.
They claimed that Hughes’ workload prevents him from attending court on a regular basis, thereby delaying the conclusion of their preliminary inquiry.
But James said that she was upset when she saw media reports of the position taken by the accused and their relatives.
A day after the protest, James said that Hughes was not the problem; it was the men’s Attorney who is otherwise tied up, resulting in the Preliminary Inquiry taking close to two years to be completed.
The Preliminary Inquiry is being conducted at the Bartica Magistrate’s Court, and Attorneys from both sides have to travel from Georgetown to the gold mining gateway community whenever the matter is called.
James expressed the hope that the DPP does not continue to bow to pressure and give in to the demands of the four accused.
James explained that she had approached the DPP to have Nigel Hughes be appointed special Prosecutor for the preliminary, since she had lost confidence in the police prosecutor who was handling the case in the initial stages.
“I wasn’t pleased with the prosecutor that they had there, because he was a ‘yes man’ and always laughing with the accused, always ‘freindsie’ with them,” James told this newspaper.
She recalled one day following a hearing of the PI, she was standing outside the courtroom with her cell phone in her hand when the accused complained to the police that she was taking their photographs.
According to James, the same police Prosecutor approached her and using expletives, chased her out of the compound without ascertaining if the men’s allegation was true.
That was when she lost all trust that her son’s murder hearing will be fairly conducted by the police Prosecutor.
“ That pushed me to get the services of Mr. Hughes…I had to write the DPP to get my own prosecutor…She asked me for reasons and I told her that the accused offered me $10 million to settle the case and I refused. If I refused, then somebody in a more desperate situation than me is gonna take it and I wouldn’t get my justice, so she agreed and Mr. Hughes accepted the position,” James said.
She is actually paying the Attorney to conduct the PI on her behalf.
James said that as far as she is aware everything was going well with the PI, since the Attorneys on both sides would agree on dates set by the Magistrate.
“When Mr. Hughes has to attend the High Court, they will get together and choose a date suitable for both sides,”
The accused recently expressed fears that with General Elections imminent and since Hughes will be expected to be very involved in campaigning for the Alliance For Change, the PI could be affected.
But the murder victim’s mother pointed out that the Attorney for the accused Latchmie Rahamat has also been granted new dates to coincide with her tight schedule.
Rahamat is one of the Attorneys integrally involved in the Walter Rodney Commission of Inquiry which is scheduled to recommence soon.
“Miss Rahamat will tell the Magistrate that she cannot come to court for three weeks because that inquiry is more important than this case and the Magistrate allows. Both sides will compromise. It was on more than two occasions that their Defence Attorney said that the Rodney Inquiry is more important than this trial,” James explained.
She said that to lay the blame on the special Prosecutor is dishonest, since Hughes had on one occasion overnighted in Bartica to ensure that the matter progressed without delay.
However, when he returned to court the following day for the continuation of the matter, the Attorney for the accused was not there.
“These people want special privileges from the court and because they realize that they can’t get the special privileges they want, they are annoyed,” James told this newspaper.
Following initial complaints by the accused, the DPP last week sent a police Prosecutor who is attached to her Chambers to Bartica to assist the special Prosecutor.
In a statement issued last Monday, the DPP said, “As a measure of precaution to avoid any further delay in the Pl, the DPP assigned Inspector Hunt to the Pl in the event that special Prosecutor Nigel Hughes does not appear.”
This move has not gone down well with the mother of the victim.
“The State is not paying Mr. Hughes, I am. I had to seek permission from the DPP to allow Mr. Hughes to prosecute for me. Now is it fair to me now that she should pick up somebody to send to prosecute a case that the person doesn’t know anything about?” James asked.
She said that she will be writing to the DPP, seeking reasons for the decision to send a police Prosecutor to Bartica to deal with the matter.
“When it was time for me to get justice for my son, I had the royal runaround. If it wasn’t for Kaieteur News, I don’t know what would have happened,” James said, referring to the persistent reporting of the matter until the men were charged.
According to James, the file on the matter was sitting in the DPP’s Chambers for two weeks without advice and it was only after they planned a picketing exercise that the police were advised to charge the four men.
“I don’t want them to play politics with this child’s life. This murder is going to be solved. It was my only son,” James stated.
THIS IDIOT TELLING GUYANA WE HAVE NO SAY IN THE 50% PROFIT SHARING AGREEMENT WE HAVE WITH EXXON.
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