AfriKa CRY BLOOD

by YVETTE BEST

A CALL has gone out to all faiths to help stop Rastafari profiling.

Speaking at Monday’s celebration of African Liberation Day in Jubilee Gardens, Ras KudosSage I said it would call for people to speak in one voice.

“As we set about to eliminate the remaining vestiges of racism, let us be mindful of the fact that there is another scourge called religious intolerance, which the Rastafari community finds itself head to head with.

“And we are calling on our brothers and sisters in faith to help us to combat this scourge and this offspring called Rastafari profiling,” he urged.

The representative from the Ichirouganaim Council for the Advancement of Rastafari (ICAR) said his brothers and sisters were still being persecuted.

“Rastafari finds itself in a position where we are continually persecuted for the way we practice our worship and for the very things that define us as Rastafari,” he said.

Noting that the African black man was similarly persecuted and rose from that position, Ras KudosSage I said “it is my hope and dream that Rastafari will do the same”. (more…)

RASHIDA FRANCIS, an employee of the Government Forensics Laboratory, testified Monday that the Maloney family examined I’Akobi Maloney’s body when they should not have done so.

Francis told the Coroner’s Court that she was at the Government Forensics Centre when she spoke to Station Sergeant Morris on the telephone about Maloney’s body. At that time the station sergeant told her that Maloney’s mother was at the Crab Hill Police Station.

She was surprised when about an hour later, Marguerita Maloney turned up at the laboratory saying she came to identify the body. However, she informed her that she would have to bring her son’s identification card and hers as well.
(more…)

A telephone operator in the Police Control Room said she received a telephone call from an unknown man on June 17, informing her that he had spotted a “Rastaman” standing on a cliff at Coves Bay, St Lucy.

Grace Boyce-Codrington said the caller also stated that he had seen a boat at sea in the same area.

Boyce-Codrington was giving evidence at the Coroner’s Court during the inquest into the death of I’Akobi Maloney, who police testified jumped over a cliff at Land Lock, St Lucy, and died.

She said she received the call around 16:43 hours and immediately relayed the information to a Sergeant Browne, whom she overheard contacting the various agencies and stations, including Crab Hill and District “E”.

The telephone operator also told the court that three minutes after receiving the call the same man called back to thank her for the police’s quick response to the scene. (more…)

by Maria Bradshaw (Nation Newspaper)

I’AKOBI MALONEY ran from two police officers and casually jumped off an 80-foot cliff at Land Lock, St. Lucy.

That was what Acting Sergeant Walter Headley told the Coroner’s Court yesterday.

The police officer described how Maloney stood on the cliff in an X position - with his hands outstretched and feet spread - then ” without hesitation” jumped off, landing 80 feet down on what Headley called a shelf.

The police officer said that despite efforts by the police to get his attention, the young man proceeded to roll off the shelf into the choppy sea where he became trapped between rocks and was battered by the sea. (more…)

by MARIA BRADSHAW

Cops search room after threat to Coroner

POLICE OFFICERS searched the Coroner’s Court yesterday as well as persons entering the courtroom, following reports that a verbal threat was made against Coroner Faith Marshall-Harris.

The court resumed its investigation into the death of I’Akobi Maloney yesterday.

It took a 15-minute break just after noon but before Marshall-Harris could return to the to the bench, a constable asked everyone to leave the court before he and a female police officer proceeded to carry out a search inside the courtroom.

The two officers then began frisking everyone entering the court. (more…)

by Barbados Advocate

THE Coroner’s Court enquiring into the death of engineer I’Akobi Tacuma Maloney, convenes next Tuesday at 2 p.m. at the locus at Landlock, St Lucy.

This was yesterday stated by Coroner Faith Marshall-Harris at the end of the second day’s hearing at the Coroner’s Court, Roebuck Street.

Maloney, 23, of Reed Street, City, died earlier this year on June 17 at Landlock, St Lucy.

The inquest opened last Monday and so far has heard 13 witnesses including the first of two officers who responded to the call on June 17, acting Sergeant, Wingrove Headley.  Inspector Martin Jones is presenting the witnesses, while attorneys David Comissiong, Andrew Pilgrim and Ajamu Boardi are representing Maloney’s family.