Latest update April 4th, 2025 12:14 AM
Police brutality probe concludes; rank to face trial next week – CPA officials displeased at irresponsibility exhibited by junior ranks
The police rank in the middle of the alleged beating of a city businessman (at East La Penitence Police Station) is expected to appear in court for trial, according to officials at the Police Complaints Authority.
Damion Mc Calman who was allegedly beaten by a police patrol rank last week.
Yesterday the complainants, Jermaine Wilson (businessman) and child mother, Jewel Bearam, met with the Chief Justice and PCA officials for the final stages of the investigation which saw matters being finalised, and court proceedings set for an undisclosed day in next week.
To speed up investigations ranks from OPR had recently visited the businessman at the Square of the Revolution in Georgetown, where he directed them to two critical witnesses from which statements were taken.
Yesterday, credible PCA sources indicated that the accused rank could face charges of assault and causing actual bodily harm to the businessman, as well as for assaulting his pregnant child mother.
They explained, also, that the rank can also be tried departmentally and if found guilty can face charges for breaching laws that surrounds the police code of conduct and SOPs.
Meanwhile, even as investigations are ongoing the rank continues to breach all protocols. He reportedly turned up in the company of colleagues in a police patrol vehicle at the home of the businessman on Monday night.
Ranks were apparently instructed to interrogate the businessman about ownership of his vehicle and their right to search his vehicle at any given period. The accused rank was seated in the front seat of the vehicle as all this was going on.
The businessman complied and made ready to give them access to search his car, when a senior officer amongst them admonished the ranks from touching the vehicle. He charged that the rank accused of police brutality was using others to his whims and fancy as he attempts to intimidate the businessman.
The businessman, Jermaine Wilson, of Lot 50 West Ruimveldt (Front Road) Georgetown, had reported that he was beaten about the body with a wooden club, kicked and had his dreadlocks pulled viciously by ranks at the station.
He reportedly sustained a broken left hand as a result of the incident.
On the other hand, there are reports that his pregnant child mother who was videoing the happenings, was cuffed twice in her abdomen after she was asked to desist by a named male rank at the facility. It is alleged that it was this said rank that dealt the businessman several blows with a wooden club at the outpost.
Videos that went viral showed the businessman being beaten even when he was handcuffed.
Meanwhile at the PCA Brickdam, Georgetown office yesterday, ranks expressed displeasure over the irresponsibility of junior police patrol ranks, who appeared before the board in a similar incident. In this instance, two ranks were appearing to answer allegations of physically abusing a young man just last week at South Ruimveldt, Georgetown.
In this matter the accused, 27-year-old Damion Mc Calman, of 30/27 North Ruimveldt, Georgetown was reportedly punched in the face repeatedly, and kicked about the body by a male rank who had conducted a search on his person as he entered a shop in the area.
Mc Calman told this publication that on Wednesday last, he was entering a shop in the area with a colleague when two patrol ranks approached him and informed they wanted to search them. He said they complied and the ranks found nothing on them.
He thinking all was well, continued on his way to make his purchase.
He said one of the ranks shouted at him, and loudly enquired where he was going. He said he informed the officer that he thought the search was completed to which the rank began using profanities loudly.
He said an argument erupted between them during which the rank punched him in his face twice, causing him to fall to the ground. He said every time he tried to get up, he was punched down, and kicked about the body.
The man said it was only when a very angry crowd of residents surrounded them, and another police officer begged him to stop, did the rank stop abusing him.
He said that at one point when he verbally challenged the rank, the man went for his weapon, indicating that he will use it without hesitation. Officials at PCA yesterday affirmed that the junior ranks were colleagues of the rank who had abused the West Front Road, Georgetown businessman, Jermaine Wilson, at the East La Penitence Police Station on July 19.
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