The official corruption and other related charges brought against a court bailiff in November 2017 have been dismissed.
On Monday, Senior Magistrate Rickie Burnett dismissed the charges against Donald Soleyn, for want of prosecution.
The magistrate’s decision came after a key witness did not attend court after being summoned despite having told police by telephone that he would attend the proceedings.
The witness was Wayne Peters, of Bequia, from whom Soleyn was accused of stealing EC$250.
The court heard that Peters had assured police officers that he would have attended the proceedings, the third time that the prosecution was trying to get him to attend court since the trial started in July.
In light of the development, Senior Prosecutor Adolphus Delplesche told the court that the prosecution’s case could not advance without Peters’ evidence.
The magistrate, therefore, dismissed the charges against the accused man.
The court had heard, in July, the testimony of Sharona Ollivierre, a former clerk at the Magistrate’s Court.
Soleyn, an Arnos Vale resident, had pleaded not guilty at his arraignment on Nov. 13, 2017 to a charge that between Dec. 31, 2015 and Jan. 1, 2017, at Bequia, being employed in the Public Service and being charged with the performance of any duty by virtue of such employment, he corruptly solicited, received, or obtained property, to wit, EC$300 in cash for himself on account of anything to be afterwards done or omitted to be done by him in the discharge of his office as a bailiff in the Magistrate’s Court.
He also pleaded not guilty to a charge that between the same dates, also at Bequia, he had in his possession criminal property to wit EC$200.
A third charge was that between the same date and at the same place, he dishonestly appropriated EC$200 in cash belonging to Wayne Peters, of Bequia, with the intention of permanently depriving Peters of the said EC$200.
Lawyer Kay Bacchus-Baptiste represented Soleyn in the matter.
She expressed confidence that her client would have also been freed if a full trial had taken place.