Cops in Crawle case say US visas cancelled
June 15, 2006
FIVE Jamaican policemen, all former members of the now disbanded Crime Management Unit (CMU), claimed yesterday that their United States visas have been cancelled.
The cops - Patrick Coke, Devon Bernard, Shane Lyons, Roderick Collier and Leford Gordon - who were charged with the 2003 murder of four civilians, including two women, in the deep rural district of Crawle, Clarendon, were all acquitted by the Jamaican High Court last December and were soon after reinstated to their jobs in the constabulary.
Senior Superintendent Reneto Adams, who headed the controversial CMU, and was reinstated to the constabulary just Monday of this week, said he did not know if his US visa has been cancelled, but should know today.
"I really do not know at this point. But tomorrow (today) I will be making an effort to find out from the embassy," Adams told the Observer. "If that is the case that would be a travesty of justice," he added.
In the meantime, Glenn Guimond, the spokesman for the US Embassy in Kingston, yesterday declined to comment on the issue. He said the issue was a private matter and as such he could not comment.
Yesterday, Constable Bernard said the cancellation of the visas was a concerted effort to further punish them for the Crawle killings, although they were tried and acquitted by the court.
"Why are we still being punished. We were found not guilty, but it would seem that we will never be able to resume the kind of life we had before the trial," Bernard said.
Bernard told the Observer that in February, Collier travelled to the US where he was held for several hours before being told that a stop order was placed against him and the other policemen who were charged in the Crawle shootings.
Bernard said that as with all such cases, travel documents were seized, but that after the case the documents would have been handed over back to them....
Author: Paul Clarke
Source: Jamaica Observer
