AfriKa CRY BLOOD

by Maria Bradshaw

I’AKOBI MALONEY was not killed by police, neither did he commit suicide. His death was ruled a misadventure.

SERGEANT WINGROVE HEADLEY (right) being escorted into the officer of the Coroner's Court by uniformed officers yesterday.

Coroner Faith Marshall-Harris handed down this decision yesterday six months after the start of the inquiry into the death of the 23-year-old Exhibition winner whom police said jumped off a 50-ft cliff at Landlock, St Lucy, last June 17, as he was about to be escorted to the Holetown Police Station.

The coroner found there was no evidence to substantiate that Maloney had been unlawfully killed by the police or that he committed suicide.

She surmised that Maloney, a Rastafarian, may have felt some form of harassment when the police requested that he accompany them to the station and so “he panicked and made a sudden dash for freedom”.

But while the coroner cited the mutual distrust between the Rastafarian community and the police and called for improved relations between the two, the verdict was not accepted by the many Rastafarian brethren who turned out yesterday.

They gathered in the courtyard surrounding Maloney’s grieving mother, Marguerita, and let it be known that there would be no peace between them and the police.

Marshall-Harris spent close to two hours reviewing the case and analysing the evidence. (more…)

A NEW WITNESS took the stand yesterday at the I’Akobi Maloney Inquest at Coroner’s Court.

Shon Boyce, who admitted to being a homosexual from his childhood days said he was introduced to Jason Collymore, a former witness at the inquest, in 2003.

He was introduced to Collymore, he said, and they subsequently got involved in a same-sex relationship where he was the outside man, since Collymore, who works at the Cement Plant, told him that he had a Rastaman and he, Boyce, should never come to the house when the man was there.

He said Collymore lived at White Hall Main Road in an apartment, and he did not know the Rastaman’s name as it was never told to him, but he used to pass a man on the stairway going down smiling as he would be going up. (more…)

AN ATTORNEY has suggested that police officers who were dispatched to Land Lock, St Lucy on the day I’Akobi Maloney died conspired to say they did not see how he died.

Andrew Pilgrim, who is representing the Maloney family, made this comment after Constables Anderson Ellis and Kevin Boyce said they did not focus on Land Lock on June 17, even though they were each in close proximity to the area.

Ellis said he was dispatched to Cove Bay and that he was focussing on a white boat which was out at sea.

He stated that he heard Sergeant Wingrove Headley transmitting on the VHF radio that he had Maloney in custody but he never looked over to Land Lock which was next to Cove Bay because he was busy looking at the boat. (more…)