Former home affairs minister Clement Rohee yesterday said that embattled Deputy Director of Prisons Gladwin Samuels who was accused of killing a prisoner in 2008 was reinstated after the case against him was dismissed.
Samuels and another prison officer Kurt Corbin had been charged with manslaughter, following the death of narcotics convict Edwin Niles.
At the time of his death, Niles was an inmate of the Georgetown Prison. He was badly beaten after being found in possession of ammunition and died nine days later.
Complaints have since been made against Samuels, following a deadly fire at the same prison last week which resulted in 17 prisoners dying. On Friday last, he was sent on leave to facilitate an investigation into claims made by prisoners.
Rohee, responding to a question which asked in part whether Samuels was kept on the job, said, “No, no, no! I didn’t keep him. No. They were interdicted. The matter went to court and the case was dismissed.”
Speaking during the weekly PPP press conference, Rohee said the Prison Service did not want to take Samuels and Corbin back on because “It… did not augur well for good governance in the prison.”
It is unclear when the case against the duo was dismissed but in 2015, Samuels headed the promotion list with a rank of Senior Superintendent of Prisons. He and Corbin had been committed to stand trial in 2010.
Based on Rohee’s explanation, the issue was deliberated on and after a lengthy period of time both officers “were given back their jobs.”
He continued, “What could we do?” adding that if they were not reinstated the matter would have been taken to court and the ministry would have been unable to put forth any grounds for not giving them back their jobs.
