(CNS): An application by the prosecution to try three men who have pleadednot guilty to kidnapping together failed in the Grand Court this morning, when Justice Alex Henderson would not allow the crown to postpone Charles Webster’s trial, which is set for 18 October, until next year. Webster is one of four men accused of kidnapping a local man in the first case of a kidnapping for ransom in the Cayman Islands. The fourth man, Wespie Mullings-Ramon, who was also scheduled to be tried on 18 October, has now pleaded guilty, leaving Webster to stand trial alone. Despite the fact that the prosecution had originally separated the four defendants into two different cases, it was revealed on Friday morning that the crown would now like to join Webster’s case with that of the other two men, set to be heard in February.
The first hurdle for crown counsel Tanya Lobben in the goal to conjoin the case against Webster with the case against Sywell Allan Kelly and Richard Robert Hurlstone was to vacate Webster’s trial date only ten days before the case was due to be heard. Webster’s attorney, Lucy Organ, raised her client’s objections and pointed out that the trial date had been set back in July and Webster, who has been in custody for more then six months since his arrest in March, was expecting the trial to happen and wanted the trial to go ahead.
The prosecution said the charges against Webster were very similar to those against Kelly and Hurlstone and the same twenty witnesses would need to be called for both trials, so for the sake of efficiency, prosecuting counsel said, the crown wished to join the two together and have just one trial instead of two.
The court heard that a pending judicial review on behalf of Kelly and Hurlstone on their case had prevented their trial, set for February 2011, from being brought forward until after that matter was heard in November. This meant the crown had to request that Webster’s trial be postponed until after the judicial review and then either a new date set for all three men to be tried together or to stick with the February date planned for Kelly and Hurlstone.
The judge said that he had to weigh the crown’s request based on “efficiency” with the fact that the defendant could be remanded in custody for a further three months, even though he had done nothing to delay the proceedings.
Justice Henderson observed that had the crown presented its application in a timely fashion it may have been possible, but he said it was simply too late. Denying the crown’s request, the judge said that, since Webster was in custody awaiting a trial that had been fixed in July, he had a reasonable expectation of a trial on 18 October and an entitlement to go to trial. Justice Henderson said that unless the crown had any further submissions the trial should go ahead.
Webster (28), a Honduran national, was arrested at Owen Roberts International airport on 23 March, a few days after the young man he and the other men are accused of kidnapping had escaped. He is facing charges of abduction, confinement, blackmail, and assault.
According to a police report from the time of the incident, the parents of the victim received a phone call on Thursday, 18 March, from a man claiming to have taken their son hostage and demanding a ransom of hundreds of thousands of dollars to secure his release. The parents were told by the kidnappers that they would kill the victim if they contacted the police but the next day the young man was reportedly able to escape from the house in Rum Point where he had been held by his captors
Wespie Mullings-Ramon, also Honduran, was charged with the same offences as Webster but has elected to plead guilty and is now in custody awaiting trial. Sywell Allan Kelly, another Honduran national, is also charged with abduction, confinement, blackmail, threatening violence and assault ABH and is also in custody.
Meanwhile, Hurlstone, who is Caymanian and charged with abduction, confinement and blackmail, is believed to be related to the victim. He and Kelly are still expected to be tried in February of next year.
