Attorney freed of obstruction of justice charge
Published:Saturday | December 17, 2022 | 1:23 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Attorney-at-law Gordon Brown walked out of the St James Parish Court a free man on Friday after being found not guilty of obstruction of justice after being accused of hindering the police’s efforts on January 13 to secure a firearm from businessman Michael Issa.
Presiding parish judge Sasha-Marie Ashley delivered the not-guilty verdict at the close of Brown’s five-month trial.
Judge Ashley said that the evidence presented to the court concerning what had allegedly transpired between Brown and the police at the Freeport Police Station on January 13 left room for reasonable doubt.
The ruling followed closing arguments from the prosecution and from Brown’s lawyer, Carolyn Reid-Cameron, KC, on December 6.
At that time, Reid-Cameron had asked the court to uphold a no-case submission made earlier on Brown’s behalf on the grounds that the case against her client was baseless and without credibility.
Brown’s charge and subsequent trial stemmed from a matter involving Issa, who is his client and is also the stepfather of nine-year-old Gabriel King, the child who was murdered on January 13.
Issa was arrested and charged with the negligent loss of a firearm, indecent language, and resisting arrest when he went to make a police report, hours after his stepson was allegedly abducted and killed.
The matter of Issa’s licensed firearm, which went missing on December 17, 2021, and was subsequently found, is unrelated to the child’s death. The negligent loss of firearm charge was eventually dismissed.
Brown was accused of preventing Issa from being detained by officers at the Montego Bay Police Station’s Criminal Investigation Branch office, in connection with the businessman’s failure to turn over his firearm to the police.
During the trial, the prosecution presented evidence from two police witnesses, who testified that Brown blocked their efforts to claim Issa’s firearm.
However, in defending Brown during the trial, Reid-Cameron challenged the competency of the witnesses, while arguing that the prosecution was manipulating the evidence. She also called a character witness, who vouched for Brown’s integrity as an attorney.
Reid-Cameron also stressed that while Brown would have been liable to pay a $2,000 fine if convicted, the fact that he would have had a conviction on his record would have resulted in him being disbarred.
“The circumstances of this case, as we see them, are very unfortunate, and a lot of what informs the position that has been taken has been informed by misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the circumstances,” Reid-Cameron argued.