Derek Achong

The State has been or­dered to pay over $700,000 in com­pen­sa­tion to a man from Co­corite, who was re­mand­ed for 18 months af­ter be­ing false­ly ac­cused of be­ing in pos­ses­sion of a bul­let proof vest to as­sist a gang. 

High Court Judge Robin Mo­hammed or­dered the com­pen­sa­tion for Kern Parkin­son af­ter up­hold­ing his ma­li­cious pros­e­cu­tion case ear­li­er this month. 

The law­suit stemmed from Parkin­son's ar­rest on No­vem­ber 12, 2015. 

Po­lice of­fi­cers claimed that they ex­e­cut­ed a search war­rant at Parkin­son's Up­per Free­dom Street, Co­corite, home and found a quan­ti­ty of mar­i­jua­na in a cig­a­rette box and a bul­let proof vest un­der a bed. 

In his law­suit, Parkin­son claimed that the of­fi­cers de­mol­ished a gal­vanised fence to en­ter his prop­er­ty and did not show a search war­rant. 

He ad­mit­ted that the of­fi­cers found the mar­i­jua­na but de­nied be­ing in pos­ses­sion of the bul­let proof vest, which he claimed the of­fi­cers on­ly showed him af­ter he was ar­rest­ed and placed in a po­lice ve­hi­cle. 

Parkin­son was charged for mar­i­jua­na pos­ses­sion and for pos­ses­sion of a bul­let proof vest for the ben­e­fit of a gang or gang mem­ber. 

He spent 18 months on re­mand be­fore he was even­tu­al­ly grant­ed bail in 2017. 

He plead­ed guilty to mar­i­jua­na pos­ses­sion and was rep­ri­mand­ed and dis­charged. He con­test­ed the charge un­der the An­ti-Gang Act and it was even­tu­al­ly dis­con­tin­ued by the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP) in May 2018. 

In de­ter­min­ing the case, Jus­tice Mo­hammed found that Parkin­son was a cred­i­ble and straight­for­ward wit­ness.

"While the De­fen­dant high­light­ed sev­er­al in­con­sis­ten­cies and im­prob­a­bil­i­ties in his ev­i­dence, I do not find them ma­te­r­i­al or to im­pugn his over­all cred­i­bil­i­ty," he said. 

He found the ev­i­dence of the three po­lice of­fi­cers to be un­re­li­able and par­tial­ly fab­ri­cat­ed.  

"In stark con­trast, I found the ev­i­dence of the De­fen­dant's wit­ness­es to be fraught with in­con­sis­ten­cies, eva­sions, and a trou­bling lack of can­dour," Jus­tice Mo­hammed said, as he not­ed that cru­cial ev­i­dence such as the search war­rant was not dis­closed in the case. 

Rul­ing that the of­fi­cers did not have rea­son­able or prob­a­ble cause to charge Parkin­son for the gang of­fence, Jus­tice Mo­hammed point­ed out that the of­fi­cers failed to pro­vide ev­i­dence on the "in­for­ma­tion for con­fi­den­tial in­for­mants" they were re­ly­ing on to link Parkin­son to gang-re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ty. 

He in­ferred mal­ice based on the con­duct of the of­fi­cers. 

Not­ing that the of­fence was non-bail­able at the time, Jus­tice Mo­hammed said: "This fact, com­bined with the com­plete lack of ev­i­dence, strong­ly sug­gests that the charge was not laid to se­cure jus­tice, but as a tool of op­pres­sion."

Jus­tice Mo­hammed or­dered $525,000 in gen­er­al dam­ages to com­pen­sate Parkin­son for his loss of lib­er­ty and the ex­treme emo­tion­al dis­tress and hu­mil­i­a­tion he en­dured. 

"This award takes in­to ac­count the se­ri­ous na­ture of the charge, the lengthy 18-month pe­ri­od of in­car­cer­a­tion in de­plorable con­di­tions, the loss of his job, the trau­ma in­flict­ed on his fam­i­ly, and the ma­li­cious and op­pres­sive man­ner in which he was treat­ed," Jus­tice Mo­hammed said. 

He or­dered $75,000 in ex­em­plary dam­ages to pun­ish the State for the op­pres­sive, ar­bi­trary, and un­con­sti­tu­tion­al con­duct of its ser­vants. 

The State was al­so or­dered to pay $85,941.78 in in­ter­est and $85,445 in le­gal costs. 

Parkin­son was rep­re­sent­ed by Criston J Williams, of Quan­tum Le­gal, and Ce­leste St Louis.

The Of­fice of the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al was rep­re­sent­ed by Na­toya Moore, and Karis­sa Singh.