Businessman on $130-million cocaine rap has ‘case to answer’
Published:Saturday | April 29, 2023 | 1:04 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
ROHAN CUMMINGS, the western Jamaica businessman, who was reportedly held with US$850,000 (J$130,008,520) worth of cocaine inside a bus he was driving in March 2022, is expected to give testimony in his own defence when he returns to the St James Parish Court on May 29.
Cummings was given the new court date and had his bail extended yesterday after presiding parish judge Kaysha Grant Pryce ruled that he had a case to answer concerning his charges of possession of, dealing in, trafficking, and conspiracy to traffic 17 kilograms of cocaine.
Judge Grant Pryce made her ruling despite a submission by Cummings’ lawyer, Henry McCurdy, that the case should be dismissed due to the prosecution’s failure to prove that the defendant knew about the drug being in the bus.
“There is nothing in the evidence to suggest that Mr Cummings had knowledge that the substance was actually there, and there is nothing sufficient to prove it. Based on my submission, he should be dismissed,” McCurdy argued.
“The prosecution has established a prima facie (self-obvious) case, as in this scenario it was him (Cummings) alone in the bus. Was anybody else in the bus? There is a case to answer,” Judge Grant Pryce said sternly.
The ruling followed testimony from a police witness that Cummings was driving the bus, which was stopped and searched in response to information that had previously been received. The officer testified that the panels of the bus were removed with a screwdriver, exposing 16 rectangular packages of cocaine.
Under cross-examination from McCurdy, the officer admitted that while Cummings’ fingerprints were taken and the packages of cocaine were dusted for fingerprints, there were no fingerprints or other DNA evidence found on the packages.
The allegations in the case are that on March 7, 2022, at 2:45 p.m., Cummings was driving the vehicle, a Toyota Hiace bus, along the Long Hill main road in St James, when he was stopped by a police team. The bus was searched, and the cocaine was found in the left-hand and right-hand panels of the vehicle.
Under caution, Cummings claimed that he had borrowed the bus to pay a visit to his granddaughter. He was taken into custody and interviewed, following which he was later arrested and charged with breaching the Dangerous Drugs Act.