- Vybz Kartel murder conviction quashed
The Privy Council has quashed the murder convictions of dancehall entertainer Adidja ‘Vybz Kartel’ Palmer and three other men, ruling that the case be sent back to Jamaica’s Court of Appeal for a ruling on whether they should be retried.
Judgment
The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council has concluded that the appeals should be allowed and the appellants’ convictions should be quashed on the ground of juror misconduct, and that the case should be remitted to the Court of Appeal of Jamaica to decide whether to order a retrial of the appellants for the murder of the deceased. Lord Lloyd-Jones gives the unanimous judgment of the Board.
Reasons for the Judgment
Issue 1 (juror misconduct)
The Board has considerable sympathy with the dilemma faced by the trial judge on the final day of a long and complex trial. Following the allegations of bribery, he had either to continue with the eleven remaining jurors or to discharge the jury. Despite this, the Board considers that the approach taken by the judge was a material irregularity in the course of the trial which makes it necessary to quash the convictions [41]–[42]. This is for three reasons.
First, the direction to the jury on the final day was inadequate to save the situation. The judge simply reminded the jury that they had sworn or affirmed that they would return verdicts in accordance with the evidence they had heard in court. The judge did not refer to the alleged bribery, of which, if the allegations were true, the jurors were already aware [43]-[44].
Secondly, the trial continued with the allegedly corrupt juror serving as one of its eleven members. In the Board’s view, there should have been no question of allowing Juror X to continue to serve on the jury. Allowing Juror X to remain on the jury is fatal to the safety of the convictions which followed. It was an infringement of the appellants’ fundamental right to a fair hearing under the Jamaican Constitution [45].
Thirdly, the judge should have considered whether the remaining jurors might have become consciously or unconsciously prejudiced for or against one or more of the appellants as a result of Juror X’s behaviour . For example, there was a danger that the attempted bribe could have made the other jurors overcompensate, consciously or unconsciously, if they assumed that the offer must have come from one of the appellants and that therefore they must be guilty. The judge took no account of this risk.
The Board is mindful of the very serious consequences which may flow from having to discharge a jury shortly before the end of a long and complex criminal trial. It is also very conscious of the danger of deliberate attempts to derail criminal trials by engineering situations in which it is necessary to discharge the jury. In England and Wales there is legislation which allows a judge in certain situations to discharge a jury because of jury tampering and to continue the trial by judge alone. There is no such legislation in Jamaica. It follows that there will be occasions where, as in this case, a court will have no alternative but to discharge a jury and end the trial to protect the integrity of the system of trial by jury.
Issue 2 (timing of jury retirement) and Issue 3 (evidence obtained in breach of the
Charter):
In view of its conclusion on the issue of juror misconduct, the Board holds that it is not necessary to express a concluded view on these grounds of appeal.
