Court to rule today on fate of Ranko Gang-linked cop
Published:Tuesday | April 12, 2022 | 12:10 AMTanesha Mundle/Staff Reporter
Senior Parish Judge Lori-Anne Cole-Montaque is expected to rule today on whether one of the policemen linked to the Clarendon-based Ranko Gang will be released.
Attorney-at-law Richard Lynch, who is representing the detainee, made a habeas corpus application last Thursday, arguing that his client has been in custody since March 25 without being charged.
However, he was informed then by a Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime Division liaison officer that the director of public prosecutions should make a ruling on Friday on whether his client is to be charged.
But when the matter was mentioned Monday, Lynch complained that his client had still not been charged and that when he questioned the liaison officer, he was first told that there was no further indication from the DPP’s office before being told that a decision was expected by midday while another officer in the matter told him by the end of the day.
Lynch asked the judge to intervene as the police have been given enough time.
But Parish Judge Cole-Montaque, while pointing out that she understood his anxiety, told him that it would be wise to exercise more patience as “the landscape of the matter could change within a few more hours”.
“The difficulty is that this has been said by the officer for two weeks now, and we are still in the same position, and I highly suspect that at the end of the day, we’ll still be in the same position,” Lynch added.
The judge, however, ordered that the matter be scheduled for mention in the morning.
The detained cop was among four policemen who were arrested in March after they were identified as being alleged members of the 27-person gang reportedly led by Constable Tafari Silvera.
It was reported that eight policemen are in the gang and that one of them fled the island when Silvera was arrested last June.
However, one of the policemen who were arrested in March was released after two complainants who had reported that he had robbed them refused to participate in his identification parade.
Silvera and two civilians, Christopher Robinson and Mark Bennett, are all currently before the Home Circuit Court on charges of conspiracy to murder.
They were arrested in relation to a plot to kill an alleged member of the gang accused of being a police informer.
The Ranko Gang, which has been linked to 17 incidents, is alleged to have carried out shootings, burglary, robbery with aggravation, illegal possession of firearm, shopbreaking, conspiracy to murder, and abduction in Clarendon, Manchester, St Elizabeth, St Catherine, St Mary, Trelawny, Kingston, St Andrew, and St James between 2019 and 2021.