Vybz Kartel and Co-Accused Freed; They Will Not Face Retrial

Dancehall artist Vybz Kartel and his co-accused Shawn ‘Storm’ Campbell, Kahira Jones, and Andre St. John will not face a new trial for the murder of Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams, the Court Of Appeal has ruled in a unanimous decision.  

On Wednesday, Justice Marva McDonald-Bishop, who leads the three-judge panel with Paulette Williams and David Fraser, announced that their decision was based on 12 factors, including the seriousness of the crime, the strength of the prosecution’s case, the availability of witnesses and evidence exhibits, the cost of a new trial, and its adverse effect on other pending cases.

“Having regard to all considerations the court has taken into account, we conclude that the interest of justice do not require a new trial to be ordered for the appellants, and we therefore make the following order: judgments and verdicts of acquittal are entered in relation to the appellants,” the justice read in a summary of the decision.

McDonald-Bishold thanked court staff, the defense, and the prosecution before adding, “That is it. The appellants are free.”

Kartel and his co-accused, who have served over 12 years in prison, have consistently denied involvement in Williams’ death.

Prosecutors had relied on telecommunication evidence — including a text message stating that Williams, whose body was never found, had been “chopped up fine fine” — and the sole eyewitness, Lamar “Wee” Chow, who testified that Williams was murdered at Kartel’s home in Havendale, St Andrew on August 16, 2011, after they were summoned there over missing guns. After a 64-day trial in the Kingston Home Circuit Court, the longest in Jamaica’s history, the men were found guilty and sentenced to life in prison in April 2014. Kartel and St John received 35 years and 30 years minimum, while Campbell and Jones received 25 years minimum.

Subsequently, in April 2020, the Court Of Appeal upheld the convictions but reduced their parole eligibility by two and a half years each.

They were then allowed to appeal to the UK-based Privy Council on the grounds that the telecommunication evidence was improperly obtained, that the jury was tainted after a bribery attempt, and that the original trial judge, Justice Lennox Campbell, placed undue pressure on the jury to reach a verdict.

In March this year, the Privy Council overturned the convictions after finding that a juror, who was accused of attempted bribery, should have been removed from the trial.

The Council’s decision stated that Justice Campbell erred when he let the accused juror participate in the final verdict, which compromised the safety of the convictions and violated the appellants’ right to a fair trial. In its verdict, the Privy Council did not rule on the admissibility of cellular evidence nor the claims of jury pressure.