Resh­ma Ra­goonath

San Fer­nan­do Mag­is­trate Mar­garet Alert was not swayed by Mara­bel­la res­i­dent Chaitram Jagdeo's claim that he was try­ing to turn his life around by at­tend­ing church.When the fa­ther of two ap­peared be­fore her for mar­i­jua­na pos­ses­sion, she or­dered him to pay a fine of $5,800."Church is not help­ing," Alert told the 23-year-old Bayshore man when he ap­peared be­fore her on Tues­day for the Ju­ly 29 of­fence.

Jagdeo, who was rep­re­sent­ed by at­tor­ney An­na Lee Gir­war, was ar­rest­ed by PC Gor­don and charged with pos­ses­sion of 20 foil pack­ets, con­tain­ing 58 grammes of mar­i­jua­na.Pros­e­cu­tor Ram­dath Phillip rec­om­mend­ed sum­ma­ry tri­al and Jagdeo plead­ed guilty.Gir­war, in her plea in mit­i­ga­tion, said Jagdeo was a fa­ther of two and his wife was eight months preg­nant with their third child. She said Jagdeo was the sole bread­win­ner in the home and want­ed an op­por­tu­ni­ty to turn his life around since he re­cent­ly start­ed at­tend­ing the Mara­bel­la Pen­te­costal Church.How­ev­er, Alert was not con­vinced by the at­tor­ney's words.

"Twen­ty foil pack­ets do not speak of per­son­al use. It speaks of pack­ag­ing for sale. I don't know if he has a drug prob­lem or a crim­i­nal prob­lem but from what you have told me church is not help­ing," she told the at­tor­ney.Jagdeo was or­dered to pay $1,800 of the fine im­me­di­ate­ly and the bal­ance by Sep­tem­ber 2. If he fails to do so, he will serve nine months in jail with hard labour.Ac­cord­ing to the facts, at around 5 pm on Ju­ly 29, PC Gor­don was on du­ty along Bayshore Ex­ten­sion, Mara­bel­la, when he stopped Jagdeo and searched him.The of­fi­cer found the 20 foil pack­ets of mar­i­jua­na in Jagdeo's right front pants pock­et.