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JLP gen sec scolds judge - Senator’s behaviour shocks courtroom
You really don’t know where you are, judge tells JLP gen sec
BY PAUL HENRY Crime/Court Desk co-ordinator ?henryp@jamaicaobserver.com
Thursday, May 19, 2011
GOV’T Senator Aundre Franklin yesterday left a court in shock and forced a premature adjournment to the murder trial of the four police officers, after he attempted to scold the presiding justice for addressing him in a manner he deemed “offensive”.
Franklin’s tirade solicited gasps from court attorneys, police officers, jurors and other members of the courtroom audience who looked on in disbelief.
“Shut up! Just shut up and listen to me!” Justice Donald McIntosh finally snapped at Franklin. “The problem with you is that you don’t know where you are. You really don’t know where you are.”
Franklin, the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) general secretary, was giving evidence in the two-week-old Home Circuit Court trial of Corporals Noel Bryan and Phillip Dunstan and Constables Clayton Fearon and Omar Miller who are before the court on allegations of fatally shooting 18-year-old Andre Thomas along a gully bank off Grants Pen Road on September 27, 2007.
Yesterday’s blow-up started after McIntosh intervened to address Franklin about his manner of response to Queen’s Counsel Jacqueline Samuels-Brown who had been questioning him.
“You’re a teacher and this is how you (behave)?” McIntosh asked. But before he could go further an agitated Franklin retorted: “An educator.” McIntosh attempted to continue but was cut off by Franklin. The senator proceeded to tell McIntosh that he, too, had not behaved like a judge in the way he told him to leave the courtroom during the morning sitting of the proceedings.
In relation to that incident, the prosecution had wanted to make legal submissions for Franklin to give evidence about a conversation he overheard during a party at the Grants Pen Police Station on the same day that Thomas was killed. The conversation included one of the police officers on trial. Before the submission was made, McIntosh asked Franklin to leave the courtroom, repeatedly stating: “Will the witness leave. Will the witness leave.”
Franklin was visibly upset and took his time in leaving the witness stand and the courtroom.
Following the luncheon adjournment, McIntosh sought to explain to Franklin that he spoke as he did because the senator would not “budge” when he asked him to leave.
But Franklin said he felt “offended” and persisted in telling the judge that the only time he had been nice was when he told him to go for lunch.
When the senator persisted in backtalking him, an exasperated McIntosh commented: “This is what our country is coming to.” He then dismissed the jurors for the day, calling a premature halt to the trial.
Franklin is to retake the witness box when the trial resumes tomorrow. Earlier yesterday, he testified that he witnessed Thomas being shot down by Dunstan, Fearon and Miller while he was standing with both his hands raised above his head.
Franklin — who said he was driving past the area and stopped after hearing explosions — said he did not see Thomas, a former student of his, with a gun. He said also that Thomas was not attacking the police officers. Bryan, he said, was not a part of the shooting.
Franklin also rejected suggestions by Samuels-Brown and Valerie Neita-Robertson that he did not witness the incident and that he only made up the story for political reasons.
JLP gen sec scolds judge - Senator’s behaviour shocks courtroom
You really don’t know where you are, judge tells JLP gen sec
BY PAUL HENRY Crime/Court Desk co-ordinator ?henryp@jamaicaobserver.com
Thursday, May 19, 2011
GOV’T Senator Aundre Franklin yesterday left a court in shock and forced a premature adjournment to the murder trial of the four police officers, after he attempted to scold the presiding justice for addressing him in a manner he deemed “offensive”.
Franklin’s tirade solicited gasps from court attorneys, police officers, jurors and other members of the courtroom audience who looked on in disbelief.
“Shut up! Just shut up and listen to me!” Justice Donald McIntosh finally snapped at Franklin. “The problem with you is that you don’t know where you are. You really don’t know where you are.”
Franklin, the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) general secretary, was giving evidence in the two-week-old Home Circuit Court trial of Corporals Noel Bryan and Phillip Dunstan and Constables Clayton Fearon and Omar Miller who are before the court on allegations of fatally shooting 18-year-old Andre Thomas along a gully bank off Grants Pen Road on September 27, 2007.
Yesterday’s blow-up started after McIntosh intervened to address Franklin about his manner of response to Queen’s Counsel Jacqueline Samuels-Brown who had been questioning him.
“You’re a teacher and this is how you (behave)?” McIntosh asked. But before he could go further an agitated Franklin retorted: “An educator.” McIntosh attempted to continue but was cut off by Franklin. The senator proceeded to tell McIntosh that he, too, had not behaved like a judge in the way he told him to leave the courtroom during the morning sitting of the proceedings.
In relation to that incident, the prosecution had wanted to make legal submissions for Franklin to give evidence about a conversation he overheard during a party at the Grants Pen Police Station on the same day that Thomas was killed. The conversation included one of the police officers on trial. Before the submission was made, McIntosh asked Franklin to leave the courtroom, repeatedly stating: “Will the witness leave. Will the witness leave.”
Franklin was visibly upset and took his time in leaving the witness stand and the courtroom.
Following the luncheon adjournment, McIntosh sought to explain to Franklin that he spoke as he did because the senator would not “budge” when he asked him to leave.
But Franklin said he felt “offended” and persisted in telling the judge that the only time he had been nice was when he told him to go for lunch.
When the senator persisted in backtalking him, an exasperated McIntosh commented: “This is what our country is coming to.” He then dismissed the jurors for the day, calling a premature halt to the trial.
Franklin is to retake the witness box when the trial resumes tomorrow. Earlier yesterday, he testified that he witnessed Thomas being shot down by Dunstan, Fearon and Miller while he was standing with both his hands raised above his head.
Franklin — who said he was driving past the area and stopped after hearing explosions — said he did not see Thomas, a former student of his, with a gun. He said also that Thomas was not attacking the police officers. Bryan, he said, was not a part of the shooting.
Franklin also rejected suggestions by Samuels-Brown and Valerie Neita-Robertson that he did not witness the incident and that he only made up the story for political reasons.
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