50-year prisoner could walk free today

THE ATTORNEY representing George Williams, the man who has been incarcerated without trial for 50 years, said that his client is anxiously awaiting the judge’s decision when his case resumes today at the St Catherine Circuit Court in Spanish Town.

“We are hoping that when he returns to court, he will be released ultimately, which is the general hope that the director of public prosecutions (DPP) will offer a nolle prosequi against Mr Williams,” Isat Buchanan told The Gleaner on Tuesday.

Williams, 71, was arrested and charged with the murder of a man in July 1970, but the then 20-year-old was declared unfit to plead. He has since been lost in the penal system.

Aldrin Jones, Williams’ brother, said that he can hardly contain his optimism at the prospect of seeing him released.

“I am feeling great about tomorrow (Wednesday). I expect freedom, and nothing else but that,” said Jones.

Last Wednesday, Justice Stephanie Jackson-Haisley, after hearing the application brought by his attorney, ordered the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP) to make a decision in one week’s time as to how to proceed with the matter.

Jones and his niece, Pamela Green, who were both present in court, were told to facilitate access to an independent psychiatrist.

Jackson-Haisley had also ordered that a social-enquiry report be done on Williams’ family to ensure that they could provide satisfactory accommodation.

They said they are capable of caring for Williams.

“We are ready to accept him, and I am just praying that the judge will send him home after so many years locked away from the world,” Jones said.

Williams was attacked and badly beaten on the weekend by a fellow inmate who is believed to be of unsound mind.

The septuagenarian is faring better, Buchanan said.

“He still has a black eye and was kicked in the ribs, so he has bruises in the abdomen area. We are still unclear what may have sparked the attack on Mr Williams,” said Buchanan.

“I know that INDECOM presented themselves to further investigate the matter, but I believe it’s his freedom more than anything else at the moment that is of concern to my client.”

Williams is one of seven mentally ill men identified in the Independent Commission of Investigations report who have each spent at least 40 years in prison awaiting trial.

His case was brought to the public’s attention when he penned a gut-wrenching application to the High Court to pour out his soul about the nearly five decades he has spent in an infested maximum-security prison awaiting trial and to win his freedom, stating that he did not “want to die like Noel Chambers”.

Chambers died on January 27 this year after spending 40 years in the Jamaican prison system awaiting trial for murder, a report by the INDECOM revealed.