When dancehall singer Vybz Kartel was freed by Jamaica’s court of appeal - after 10 years in prison for murder - last week crowds of his fans came onto the streets and danced in delight at the news.
One fan in the star’s Portmore neighbourhood told the island’s Gleaner newspaper, which quoted him in patois: “Mi tell them from last night sey Kartel a go free, we expect progress in the community now that he is free, Jamaica number one entertainer."
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Kartel, whose tracks include “Guns Like Mine” and “Bad Man”-had been expected to face aretrialfor the 2011 murder of Clive “Lizard” Williams - but the Jamaican judges ruled he could not get a fair trial and should go free.
I will refresh your memory on the Vybz Kartel case later, but first let’s take a little look at the history of celebrities and crime.
In September 1921 actress Virginia Rappe died four days after a mysterious assignation with silent movie star Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle in Room 1219of the Palace Hotel in San Francisco in September 1921.
Arbuckle was accused of rape and manslaughter - he had supposedly crushed her when he lay on top of Rappe - but was acquitted at a third trial.
Every detail of the three trials were covered in great detail by the major American newspapers.
Seventy years later a very different star in a very different era, walked free after being accused of murder.
Snoop Dogg - real name Calvin Broadus - was accused of murdering Philip Woldemariam, a member of a rival gang, the By Yerself Hustlers, in Woodbine Park, west Los Angeles.
Snoop's bodyguardMcKinlay Lee - who had fired the fatal shots -was acquitted on the grounds of self-defence immediatelybut it took longer for Broadus, then aged 24, to gain his freedom.
Snoop - who made his name in 1993 when Doggystyle, debut album, broke all sorts of sales records- is nowadays a cuddly family favourite who popped up during the recent Paris Olympics and advertises the Just Eat fast food delivery app.
A year earlier, of course, American football star turned actor, O.J. Simpson, was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman.
Simpson was later found responsible for the pair’s death by a jury in a civil trial but died earlier this year, aged 76, having paid the victims’ parents only a fraction of the $34 million damages which were awarded against him.
The parents of Vybz Kartel’s alleged victim are unlikely to sue for damages.
Kartel – real name Adidja Palmer –is a huge star in Jamaica but is also well known throughout the world of music.
Hecollaborated with Major Lazer in 2009 for the hit “Pon De Floor,” which has since been sampled by Beyoncé on her song, “Run the World (Girls).”
The dancehall star was convicted, in 2014,along with co-defendants Shawn “Shawn Storm” Campbell, Kahira Jones and Andre St John for the murder of Clive “Lizard” Williams in Jamaica.
Williams has not been seen since August 16, 2011 and his body has never been found.
The original murder trial heard Williams was murdered after he failed to return two unlicensed guns which Kartel had given him for safekeeping.
But the trial was marred by the conduct of a juror, Livingstone Cain, who attempted to bribe others on the jury. He offered them 500,000 Jamaican dollars (£2,500) each if they acquitted Kartel.
Last year Cainwas jailed for 9 months for attempting to pervert the course of justice.
The British justice system takes jury conduct very seriously.
At the start of almost every trial in England and Wales judges warn jurors of their responsibilities and warned they could be sent to jail if they breach the rules surrounding conduct in the jury room.
Jamaica’s criminal justice system - like many other Caribbean countries which were once part of the British Empire – is built on British legal principles.
So when Kartel, Campbell and the other two defendants appealed up to the judicial committee of the Privy Council in London (JCPC) as the “court of last resort”, one of their grounds of appeal fell on fertile soil.
At a two-day hearing last in February, a British barrister,Peter Knox, representing the Jamaican government, floundered as he tried to play down the trial judge’s error in ploughing on with the trial even after the bribery allegations had surfaced.
I discussed the case with Andre Williams, a journalist with Jamaica’s Gleaner newspaper, and we both predicted the correct outcome – a quashed conviction.
Lord David Lloyd-Jones, speaking on behalf of the five law lords who made up the JCPC panel, said: “The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council has unanimously concluded that the appeals should be allowed and the appellants convictions should be quashed on the grounds of juror misconduct and that the case should be remitted to the Court of Appeal in Jamaica to decide whether to order a retrial of the appellants.”
He said: "The board is very mindful of the serious consequences which may flow from having to discharge a jury shortly before the end of a long and complex trial. It is also very conscious of the danger of deliberate attempts to derail criminal trials by engineering situations in which it is necessary to discharge a jury.”
The JCPC panel said the judge's direction to the jury on the final day of the trial was "inadequate to save the situation".
"The judge simply reminded the jury that they had sworn or affirmed that they would return verdicts in accordance with the evidence they had heard in court," they said.
A second grounds for appeal – whether the judge should have allowed telecommunications evidence to be admissible – was not ruled on by the JCPC because they had already thrown out the conviction.
It remains to be seen whether the telecommunication evidence will be ruled admissible in any retrial.
The police had seized the mobile phones of Kartel, Campbell and a key witness, Lenard Chow, and ordered phone network Digicel to give them access to messages and call records which were crucial to the prosecution.
A Blackberry Torch belonging to Kartel and its SIM card contained crucial pieces of evidence which were used to link him to Williams’ murder.
So it was left to the Court of Appeal in the Jamaican capital, Kingston, to decide if he should face a retrial.
The Acting Director of Public Prosecutions,Claudette Thompson, argued Kartel and his co-accused should not be allowed to walk free as a result ofa technical blunderby the trial judge.
Kartel’s legal team argued it would be impossible to find a jury which would be able“to disavow itself from the notion that the accused men somehow benefited... from the action of the blunder with the jury".
Three judges, led by Justice Marva McDonald-Bishop, sided with the defence and cleared the way for Kartel to be released from Tower Street adult correctional facility.
A few hours later Kartel, 48, popped up on X, formerly Twitter, and posted a selfie video of himself and his “wifey”, Sidem Ozturk, who hails from north London’s Turkish community.
Ozturk, a psychology graduate and former social worker, told an American journalist she had begun corresponding with Kartel in 2015 and got engaged during a prison visit in 2022.
She said: “He’s smart. I love his heart. He has an amazing heart. It’s just so giving, so loving. I like to call him my angel. He’s an angel in my life. I can’t deny how happy he makes me feel."
Kartel is reportedly suffering from Graves’ Disease, an autoimmune disorder which can cause and overactive thyroid gland.
But that hasn’t stopped putting out a mixtape, which is already racking up views on YouTube.
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