File photos
Reputed Shower Posse leader Vivian Blake leaving the Central Police Station on Thursday, January 29.
THE YEAR was 1988 when the United States (US) Drug Enforcement Authority (DEA) named Vivian Blake and Lester Lloyd 'Jim Brown' Coke in an unsealed indictment. The charges were drug trafficking, racketeering, murder, illegal trade and purchase of weapons, bribery, among other crimes.
A dragnet was set for the 34 persons named in the indictment but Coke and Blake escaped. It was to be the start of a massive attempt to trap members of the Shower Posse, which grew out of Tivoli Gardens, West Kingston, and had spread its tentacles throughout the US.
US Federal Authorities said then that they had taken into custody two of the Shower Posse alleged ring leaders, Errol Hussing and Tony Bruce.
Blake, charged with the most serious counts, faced a maximum of 390 years in prison and US$15.5 million in fines. It was the first time the Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organisation had been used against Jamaicans.
Administrative error
Coke, more commonly called Jim Brown, died in a fire in his cell at the General Penitentiary in Kingston on February 23, 1992, while awaiting extradition to Florida on the charges.
Morrison, also called Storyteller, was, like Coke, awaiting extradition to the United Stated on drug, murder and arms charges. He was extradited to the US because of an administrative error in June 1992, and in May 1993 was sentenced to 241/2 years without parole on cocaine charges.
Blake had escaped to Jamaica and made Jamaica's most-wanted list until he was captured and extradited. When he was being taken away from the South block of the St Catherine District Prison, hands and feet in cuffs, Blake reportedly complained that the handcuffs were too tight but was whisked away in a JDF helicopter.
He pleaded guilty to conspiracy and possessing cocaine with intent to distribute the drug in the US and was sentenced to 28 years in prison for racketeering in 2000. He returned to Jamaica in January.
In May, two other Shower Posse members were extradited to the United States to face multiple drug charges.
Tonya Brown, 36, and David Stewart, 34, who US officials believed were members of the infamous drug ring, were extradited to the US on May 22 to face charges of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and conspiracy to distri-bute cocaine and cocaine base, crack.
Brown, a cosmetologist of Spanish Town Road, Kingston 11, and Stewart, unemployed, resided in Independence City, Portmore, St Catherine. Both were held in proximity to the Kingston Public Hospital by the Jamaica Constabulary Force's fugitive apprehension team on March 26 and extradited two months later.
Reins of power
Late last month, attention was turned to Christopher 'Dudus' Coke, who 'sits' in for Prime Minister Bruce Golding, who represents West Kingston in Parliament.
Dudus, son of Jim Brown, took over the reins of power in the tough enclave of Tivoli Gardens, West Kingston, after his elder brother, 'Jah T', was murdered in the People's National Party (PNP) stronghold of Maxfield Avenue, St Andrew.
Should Dudus be uprooted from his base, Sunday Gleaner source says his brother, 'Livity', is poised to take over.
He is wanted in the US for alleged narcotics and arms trafficking. Several attempts to reach Justice Minister Dorothy Lightbourne via email and telephone for an update on an extradition hearing were unsuccessful.
LEFT: Police escorting Donovan Williams (left) to the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate's Court on March 10, 2004, for his extradition hearing
RIGHT: Leebert Ramcharan being escorted to the Corporate Area Resident Magistrate's Court on March 10, 2004, for his extradition hearing.
IT IS never a done deal that an accused will be extradited whenever the justice minister signs the request for extradition to begin.
A few Jamaicans have escaped extradition after proving in court that there has been a miscarriage of justice.
The most recent cases are those of Colin Dwight Headley, Newton Barnes and Walter Gilbert Byles.
Headley was released from prison in 1999 after he applied for a writ of habeas corpus on the grounds that there was no proof of the illegal drugs he was alleged to have distributed in the United States (US).
Uncorroborated hearsay
Headley was wanted in the US to face drug-related charges but there was no evidence to show that the substance was cocaine or cocaine-based.
Headley's lawyers Ian Ramsay, QC, and Jacqueline Samuels-Brown argued that it would be unjust and oppressive to extradite Headley in the circumstances where the evidence against him consisted of uncorroborated hearsay testimony by convicted persons.
In the case of Barnes, a building contractor of Kingston, the Supreme Court freed him in 1995 for various reasons, which included the inordinate long time of 17 years from the date of the alleged offences for which extradition was sought. The court said it would be oppressive to extradite Barnes after such an inordinate delay.
Meanwhile, the court frowned at the long delay from the time of the alleged offences and when extradition was being sought, and said it would be unjust and oppressive to extradite Byles.
A warrant was issued for Byles' arrest in 1988 but the request for extradition was not made until September 1993. Byles was arrested in Jamaica in November 1994.
The Court of Appeal upheld submissions from attorneys Ian Ramsay and Jacqueline Samuels-Brown that Byles had been working in Jamaica since 1988 and did not conceal his whereabouts or sought to evade arrest.
Meanwhile, several Jamaicans in recent years have not had much luck in fighting extradition requests.
In July 2008, five natives were extradited to the US to face drug charges.
The men are Robroy Williams, also known as 'Spy', 51; Norris Nembhard, aka 'Dido', 53; Glenford Williams, aka 'Toe', 55; Vivian Dalley, aka 'Jungo', 49, and Herbert Henry, aka 'Scary', 46, pleaded guilty to the charges against them, the US Justice Ministry reported on Monday.
Conspiracy
The men all pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to import more than five kilograms of cocaine and more than 1000 kilograms of marijuana into the US.
Leebert Ramcharan and Donovan 'Plucky' Williams also fought extradition requests and failed in 1997. Both have been convicted by a US federal court in Miami and are now serving time in prison.
Jamaica is still to liquidate the assets of persons extradited.
Acting Commissioner of Police Glenmore Hinds, head of Kingfish, said that no final resolution has been reach in respect to the assets of persons extradited.
"The assets recovery is part of the investigation. You might take physical possession of the asset but there is a process for final resolution of it and those processes are still ongoing," Hinds said.
The Proceeds of Crimes Act allows the state to seize assets which have been acquired through illegal means.
daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com