A defence lawyer has claimed her objection to a “one fits all approach to justice” when it comes to dealing with persons who are jointly charged in a failed bid for bail for her client.
Attorney-at-law Angella Mitchell-Gittens’ stance came after the Crown objected to bail for her client, Roshawne Romario Gibbs, of Dunlow Lane, St Michael. He is accused of stealing 198 packages of hair worth over $54,000 between May 12 and 15 for trespassing at Beautylicious trading as No. 1 Beauty Supply.
Gibbs’ appearance in the District ‘A’ Magistrates’ Court comes five months after the first charges in connection with the offence were laid before the court.
Station Sergeant Cameron Gibbons informed Magistrate Kristie Cuffy-Sargeant that the Crown was objecting to bail for the accused and also sought to have the case transferred to the No. 1 Criminal Court where other accused men, who are currently on remand at Dodds, will reappear on November 27.
Mitchell-Gittens said she had no issue with the transfer but declared: “This one-size-fits-all approach to justice I would have to take an exception to because there might have been a perfectly good reason for the others to be remanded; I don’t know.”
The defence attorney said her client was a fit and proper candidate for bail, as he had had no previous convictions “except the matter that he was just convicted for in this court”.
Moments before, Gibbs, 22, had pleaded guilty to entering Sky Mall on July 4 and stealing three cellular phones worth $2,483 and three tablets worth $2,760 from Digicel Barbados Limited. Then a November 3 assault charge against him was dismissed after the complainant told the court she was no longer interested in pursuing the case.
Mitchell-Gittens told the magistrate: “Given that from the charge sheet this matter is said to have taken place in May of this year and since that time Mr Gibbs has not been the subject of a wanted man bulletin, he has continued to reside in Dunlow Lane and he has continued to go about his business.
“If since from May to November his involvement in this matter was not urgent enough that he was brought into custody, [then] certainly it cannot be that at this stage where it is merely an allegation.
“We know that in the normal course of things it takes some for a file to be taken before the court.
“He certainly will not spend a year on remand while we await a file at some point he will become a fit and proper candidate for bail and it is my respectful submission that today is as good a day as any.”
But Magistrate Cuffy-Sargeant told Mitchell-Gittens that today was not the day as she ruled in favour of the prosecution and remanded the accused to Dodds until November 27.
A report on Gibbs’ life has also been ordered in preparation for sentencing on the Digicel burglary conviction.
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