Court hears complainant’s robbery plot backfired

Jun 03, 2017 Court Stories, Features / Columnists, News

– Saw miller placed on bail
Joshua Cummings appeared before Magistrate Clive Nurse at the Wales Magistrate’s Court yesterday and was granted $35,000 bail on a charge of unlawful wounding.

Dwaine Wilkinson

He was charged for wounding his employee, Dwaine Wilkinson, on May 24, last, on a trail up the Linden/Soesdyke Highway.
The matter has been transferred to the Linden Magistrate’s Court and will be called on July 4.
The prosecutor told the court that on the aforementioned date, Wilkinson was beaten by a group of unknown men. The plot was allegedly orchestrated by Cummings.
In court, Cummings’s lawyer, Jerome Khan argued to the contrary that the virtual complainant’s (Wilkinson) plan to rob the defendant backfired.
Khan told the court that as a result of Wilkinson’s own plan being backfired, he suffered injuries at the hands of unknown persons.
The defendant’s lawyer argued that it was Wilkinson who initiated and organized for the defendant to go to Linden under the pretence of knowing someone with a used caterpillar forklift engine for sale.
The court heard that as the VC and the defendant were approaching Linden, the VC requested that Cummings pull over in a trail—the person who was selling the engine was reportedly further up the trail.
Cummings, who is nursing a broken leg, opted not to get out of the vehicle so the VC went to get the person to bring him/her back to the defendant.
It is alleged that a terrified Cummings waited for some 10 minutes and after he could not get Wilkinson on the phone, he drove back out on the main road. There, he unsuccessfully tried to contact the VC and then made contact with his father.
The defendant who had about $1M cash on him to purchase the engine was allegedly urged to return home.
Cummings’s lawyer told the court that his client only heard about Wilkinson’s assault the following day when the police made contact with him.