A Stabroek Market food vendor was remanded to prison last week by Magistrate Hazel Octive-Hamilton on a charge of possession of drugs and his subsequent allegation against a policeman led to a detailed statement being taken from him.
Magistrate Octive-Hamilton ordered an investigation into the matter and for the Police Prosecutor to take the man’s statement in court after he pleaded guilty and told the magistrate that an officer had given him the cocaine to sell.
Gary Nurse of D’Urban Street, Werk-en-Rust is alleged on December 8 in Georgetown to have had in his possession two grammes of cannabis. He pleaded not guilty to that charge. It is also alleged that on December 8 Nurse had in his possession for the purpose of trafficking 25 grammes of cocaine. He pleaded guilty `with explanation’ to that charge.
Police Prosecutor in the matter, Shellon Daniels told the court that Nurse was found with a black bag which contained the suspected cocaine. A search was carried out on his person and in his right front pocket the suspected cannabis was found in a clear plastic, the prosecutor said. Nurse, the prosecutor said, told the police after they confronted him, “Is just a lil hustle I doing”.
Meanwhile Nurse in his defence clarified that the drugs were not in his possession but on a stand in the Stabroek Market. He went on to tell the court that the said policeman that confronted him on the day gave him 320 pieces of a white substance to sell. “I give he $16,000 at the said time for it,” Nurse told the court.
After he made this revelation, Magistrate Octive-Hamilton ordered the Prosecutor to take the man’s statement right there in court. She said that it was a very serious allegation that needed to be investigated.
Before he gave his statement to the prosecutor, Nurse further said, “On the day I was arrested I declared my money which was $30,000 at the time he was searching me. I place it on the ground and when they finish I couldn’t find my money.”
He then proceeded to give his statement to the prosecution. The nearly four-page statement took approximately two hours to be completed and was read aloud by the Magistrate. In the statement, Nurse told of his work in the market and meeting and later agreeing to sell the cocaine provided by the policeman. The statement provided a detailed description of the policeman who gave him the drugs to sell. Nurse said he only knew of the policeman by a call name.
The magistrate called the matter a serious one and said that she might be inclined to believe Nurse since he did not hesitate to provide any detail of what transpired between him and the cop.
Addressing Nurse after the statement was taken she told him that she is changing his plea to not guilty. She then ordered an investigation into Nurse’s allegations as well as ordered that the file and a copy of the statement that was taken in court be sent to the DPP.