Adidja 'Vybz Kartel' Palmer and Shawn 'Shawn Storm' Campbell
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A report from Radio Jamaica's legal analyst Dionne Jackson Miller
By Dionne Jackson Miller
In Tuesday's session of the Court of Appeal hearing to decide if entertainer Vybz Kartel and his co-accused should be retried for murder, attorney John Clarke argued that a retrial would breach the constitutional rights of the appellants.
Kartel, whose given name is Adidja Palmer; Shawn 'Shawn Storm' Campbell; Kahira Jones; and Andre St. John were convicted in March 2014 for the murder Clive 'Lizard' Williams and sentenced to life in prison a month later.
On March 14 this year, the UK-based Privy Council overturned the convictions on the grounds of juror misconduct, sending the matter back to Jamaica's Court of Appeal for it to decide whether the murder case should be retried.
On Tuesday, attorney John Clarke, speaking for the appellants, started to build his arguments that it would not be in the interests of justice for the Court of Appeal to order a retrial in the murder case.
In doing this, he went through the Privy Council ruling that quashed the men's convictions, highlighting issues those judges had raised which he said the Court of Appeal now has to look at.
He pointed to, for instance, the length of the first trial - 64 days - and the complexity of the trial.
Mr. Clarke argued that, given that the appeals process has so far taken ten years, the men's constitutional right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time now comes into question.
He contended further that if the prosecution wants the court to order a retrial, they have to show how this can be done without breaching the rights of the appellants.
He also said other constitutional rights of the appellants which could be affected by a retrial, are the right to examine witnesses if they are no longer available, and also the right of the men to hire lawyers of their choosing since the length of the case has affected their financial ability to hire the lawyers they want.
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