Today, April 13, will mark two years since Cornelius John, a 62-year-old blocker, was maltreated in the privacy of his own home. John’s dilemma came to light after News 784 (now St. Vincent Times) broke the story that he was shot, beaten, and threatened on his property.
John told us that on the afternoon of April 13th, he was sitting on a block in his unfinished porch when three persons, one woman and two men dressed in jeans, t-shirts, masks, and caps, entered his property without prior warning.
He said the taller of the men walked up to him and began kicking him in the stomach, which caused him to defecate on himself.
“I could not recognize his face because he was wearing a cap and a mask, so I could not make out who he was. While I was lying in pain on the ground, he pulled out his gun, cranked it, and told me, You want to kill the senator? You want to kill the senator?” and he proceeded to hold down my left foot and shoot me in it”.
The 62-year-old hypertensive said in April 2021 that the woman who entered his property along with the other two men pointed a gun to his face and told him if he called her name in any conversation, she would shoot him in the mouth. He identified the woman as Government Senator and Deputy Speaker of the House of Parliament, Ashelle Morgan.
When pressed back then as to how he knew it was Senator Morgan, John replied, ‘It was not hard to identify her’.
“I recognize her build and her voice; I looked at her; she grew up around here; I’ve known her since she was a child; she lives up the road, not too far from me.”
John said that after he told her, “Look at my mouth; shoot me in it,” they (the perpetrators) took off up the road.
“After the pain started to become unbearable, I shouted, “You shoot me in my foot,” and people started coming out of their houses, and they ran off in the direction where she lives.”
The DPP and Charges
After several months of John’s plight being tried in the court of ‘public opinion, charges were laid against John, and those he said had come to his home uninvited and inflicted what he calls ‘scares for life’.
(DPP) – “Given my assessment of the facts and circumstances, applying legal principles and the Code for Prosecutors, I advised the Commissioner of Police to lay the following charges”:
Threatening Language against Mr. Cornelius John in respect of complaints made by Mrs. Nicole John;
Threatening Language against Mr. Cornelius John in respect of a complaint made by Ms. Ashelle Morgan;
Wounding and Unlawful discharge of firearm against Mr. Karim Nelson in respect of complaints by Mr. Cornelius John; and
Assault with intent to commit Wounding against Ms. Ashelle Morgan in respect of a complaint by Mr. Cornelius John.
The outcome -November 2021
On November 26, 2021 and after a trail that lasted for a week, Senator Ashelle Morgan dropped the charge against Cornelius John of Diamond.
On Thursday, 18 November, Magistrate Bertie Pompey announced his decisions, upholding no-case submissions made on Wednesday, 17 November by defense lawyers Ronald Marks and Duane Daniel at the close of the prosecution’s case in the trial, which lasted almost a week.
The magistrate’s upholding of the no-case submissions acquitted Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions Karim Nelson and Deputy Speaker of the House of Assembly, and government senator Ashelle Morgan of criminal charges brought against them following the 13 April 2021 shooting of 62-year old businessman Cornelius John at his residence in Diamond.
