Vybz Kartel Wins Privy Council Appeal 

Dancehall artists Adidja ‘Vybz Kartel’ Palmer, Shawn ‘Storm’ Campbell, and two others had their convictions overturned by the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) in London due to an unfair trial in Jamaica.

The Privy Council’s decision, announced on Thursday (March 14), sends the matter back to Jamaica’s Court of Appeal, which will determine whether a retrial should be held.

The four men—including Kahira Jones and Andre ‘Mad Suss’ St. John—have served 12 and half years in prison for the murder of Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams.

Prosecutors had relied on cellphone records and testimony from Lamar “Wee” Chow, the sole eyewitness, who said that Lizard was killed at Kartel’s home in Havendale, St Andrew, in August 2011. After a 64-day trial in the Kingston Home Circuit Court, the longest in Jamaica’s history, the men were sentenced to life in prison in April 2014. Subsequently, in April 2020, the Jamaica Court Of Appeal upheld the conviction but reduced their parole eligibility by two and a half years each.

They were then allowed to appeal to the UK-based Privy Council on the grounds that crucial cellular evidence was improperly obtained, that the jury was tainted after a bribery attempt and that the original trial judge, Justice Lennox Campbell, placed undue pressure on the jury to reach a verdict. This final appeal was heard on February 14 and 15.

On Thursday, the Privy Council judges—Lord Reed, Lord Lloyd-Jones, Lord Briggs, Lord Burrows, and Lady Simler—were unanimous in deciding that the appeal should be allowed and that the conviction was unsafe and should be squashed.

More to come.