Today the Bladen 11 and their two associates, the Caliz siblings, were back in court for their bail hearing. Except, there was no hearing, and now they will remain in prison for the next week. And of course, their lawyers were not too happy about this.
Though it was held virtually, outside the Belize City court house, Richard "Dickie" Bradley, who is representing Sergeant George Ferguson, Corporal Elmer Nah, Corporal Delwin Casimiro, PC Nelson Middleton and Epifania Caliz, explained that his clients were being treated unfairly and some of the detainees were even beaten while in custody. And now, they won't be back in court until the 23rd of this month. And Bradley said the fault lies on the police prosecutor since the DPP cannot be involved in the case. Here's how he put it:
Richard "Dickie" Bradley, Attorney
"All of them, imagine, have been charged for all the drugs that have been located and found, even though none of them, they didn't find with any drugs. You can't charge for possession, I don't own a plane. We won't get in to all of that."
"This morning in the supreme court of Justice Antionette Moore, the Director of public prosecution has sent to me and the judge a formal written document which says because of the situation which has to do with a police officer employed and assigned to the DPP's office - I want to give her big respect, she did the correct thing, that the DPP's office did not get involved in the matter of the bail application. They ask a prosecutor from the police department and I will not call any name, but the lawyers are not happy with that person at all, is not suitable, is not mature enough, but that will be for another time. In any event as they all suspected she came with an excuse that she needed 2 weeks to prepare and submit a document that she was objecting to the bail application. Can you imagine that? Want to keep them locked up for a year or two."
"The police is embarrassed; the government of the country and our nation has been embarrassed by the allegations against police officers. But we don't go and punish people for that. There is a time and a place when a trial is held."
"The accused persons from up north they suffered a horrific beating at the hands of the police and one of them could barely walk and so on and so forth which is totally unnecessary. We want to know who are behind these planes, we want to know the connections, beating people don't help in that matter."
And Bradley was also upset that one of his clients, Epifania Caliz, was dragged into this mess in the first place.
Richard "Dickie" Bradley, Attorney
"Officer Nah's wife was charged for ammunition found in officer Nah's vehicle, which is an injustice. An injustice because officer Nah is assigned to a special elite group of police officers in this country, he is not Elvis Presley, he is not the most popular person and we can't punish his wife for that and so he had allegedly a bullet proof vest, a firearm and he had quite a quantity of ammunition - had nothing to do with his wife, she is just a passenger, she wasn't driving the vehicle, she does not own the vehicle and he has been man enough to say these are items issued to me by the police. He has taken the responsibility. He has pled not guilty to illegally or having ammunition without a license, because he can't plead guilty to that, he will go to jail. We might not like somebody, but we must always be fair, because the way they treated those officers is really unprofessional and unnecessary. They had they jammed up in a little room, 6 feet by 6 feet, like they are animals. We need to put a stop to that."
Since next Friday is a holiday, there cannot be another bail hearing then. But Bradley explained that the judge has set down November 23rd for written submissions and responses to be heard.
