CONSTABLE Collis “Chucky” Brown, who was last month convicted on three counts of murder, will have to wait until after the Christmas and New Year holidays to know his fate.
The constable, who was also found guilty on charges of conspiracy and wounding with intent, was scheduled to be sentenced in the Home Circuit Court yesterday but it was postponed until January 3, which could be an agonising wait for him.
The sentencing was postponed in part due to the late arrival of the social enquiry report and to facilitate a request that was made for those who contributed to the report to be present so that it could be tested.
Brown, a 15-year veteran who was assigned to the May Pen Police Station in Clarendon, is being sentenced in relation to the January 10, 2009 murder of Damoy “Gutty” Dawkins and the December 13, 2012 murders of Dwayne Douglas and Andrew Fearon, all in Clarendon.
The constable, who was arrested and charged in January 2014 and has since been in custody, was slapped with the charges after he met with the Independent Commission of Investigations (INDECOM) twice in August 2013, when he was captured on tape and on video disclosing that he was a member of a special squad of police officers from the May Pen Police Station who had been selected to “sort out bad men” in the Clarendon Police Division, and detailed how the killings occurred and how the group operated.
During the meetings, which occurred on August 6 and 10, Brown told the INDECOM officials that the squad was established by a senior member at the police station and that the officer supplied the team with motor vehicles, ordinary shotguns and keep-and-care M16 rifles, as well as money for them to purchase firearms which they would plant on some of the victims and became short on the guns that they would have normally been given from the May Pen Police Station’s armoury.
Brown also disclosed that the extrajudicial shootings were done by two methods — while operating undercover and as actual police officers. He said that the team started out by going undercover, but under the guidance of a senior officer reverted to overt operations when suspicions were raised that police officers were involved in killings.
However, Brown, during his unsworn statement, denied having anything to do with Dawkins’ death but told the court he was acting in self-defence when he fired at the other two men.
Brown was yesterday further remanded by presiding judge Justice Vivene Harris.
