Prosecution, defence clash in major drug case - Drummond further implicates accused in video-link testimony
Published:Tuesday | September 24, 2019 | 12:27 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Tempers flared in the St James Parish Court yesterday as the prosecution and the attorneys representing the four Montego Bay men on trial in a major drug-smuggling and money-laundering case clashed over claims that full disclosure of documents had not been done by the prosecution.
Attorney-at-law Oswest Senior-Smith, who is part of the defence team for Delroy Gayle, Robert Dunbar, Louis Smith and Melford Daley, started the verbal clash when he expressed concern about the lack of details from the prosecution on the trial of convicted drug smuggler Christopher Drummond, who started his testimony for the Crown via video link last Friday from prison in the United States, where he is serving a 27-year sentence.
“My disclosure seems insufficient, and I don’t know how much I do not have, but I do know that there is more I should have got,” Senior-Smith told presiding judge Sandria Wong-Small.
“My disclosure takes me up to the defence’s case in the trial of Mr Drummond ... . My friends (the prosecution) should be able to say they provided a complete transcript of the trial, and they cannot do that,” added Senior-Smith.
But prosecutor Andrea Martin-Swaby staunchly declared that the prosecution did all it could to get the information years before the trial began.
“These matters of disclosure were dealt with between 2014 and 2015, and it was at that juncture that we proceeded to set a trial date. We have given the defence everything we have, and we have nothing else to disclose,” Martin-Swaby said heatedly.
“I think that, at this stage, it’s unfair to rehash things which would have been dealt with by my sister judges,” Wong-Small answered firmly.
Transported cocaine
Meanwhile, in his second day of testimony, Drummond told the court that he worked with Daley and Smith to transport cocaine between Jamaica and the United States.
“Mr Daley and I made arrangements in which I would receive cocaine and he would help with its sale. Mr Smith and I would strap the drugs on our bodies and fly with them,” said Drummond, who is to continue his testimony this morning.
The allegations are that Gayle, Dunbar, Smith, and Daley were involved in drug trafficking between Jamaica and the United States between 1999 and 2005.