$200k bail for former Clansman trial accused
Published:Thursday | October 19, 2023 | 12:10 AMTanesha Mundle/Staff Reporter
A labourer, who was freed in March of anti-gang charges in the Clansman-One Don Gang trial, was on Tuesday offered $200,000 bail following allegations that he and another man robbed a truck driver of almost $500,000.
Dwight ‘Jim Brown’ Hall, 34-year-old labourer of Buck Town in Spanish Town, who is charged with robbery with aggravation, was ordered to return to court on July 18 when the case will again be mentioned.
Allegations are that on May 24, the complainant was conducting business in Spanish Town, St Catherine, when Hall, who is known to him and another man, rode up on bicycles and robbed him of a knapsack containing $495,000.
The complainant had reportedly just collected the money from an individual to purchase steel.
According to the complainant, when he told the men that the money was not his, they told him that he was on his own.
He further alleged that Hall threatened him, saying “a ded me fi ded”.
The complainant reported the incident and later positively identified Hall during an identification parade.
Hall was offered bail by Parish Judge Annette Austin after his attorney-at-law Courtney Rowe convinced the judge to admit the accused to bail despite strong opposition from the police and the clerk of court.
The investigating officer told the court that he knew Hall to be part of a gang.
But Rowe asked the judge to dismiss what he described as a “baseless claim’ while pointing out that Hall was once charged for being part of a criminal organisation and was found not guilty by Chief Justice Bryan Sykes.
The judge subsequently offered Hall bail on reporting conditions. He was also subjected to a curfew order.
The accused is scheduled to return to Court on December 1.
Hall was among 17 alleged gangsters who were freed in the trial, which started in September 2021.
Of the 17 who were freed, five of them were previously conceded by the prosecution following the no-case submission by the defence.
Among those convicted was Andre ‘Blackman’ Bryan, leader of the One Don faction of the Clansman Gang, who was sentenced to 39 years and six months for being the leader of a criminal organisation and seven counts of facilitating the commission of a serious offence by a criminal organisation.