PROTESTORS: FREE CLINTBy MARISSA WILLIAMS Tobago Bureau Tuesday, August 11 2009
Even as Clint Alexis appeared before a Scarborough magistrate on charges of attempting to murder British couple Peter and Murium Greene, scores of relatives and residents of his village in Argyle, Tobago, staged a heated protest over his innocence.
“This is war. I don’t believe he did this thing at all. They have the wrong man in court today and the real perpetrators out there laughing at them,” one emotional resident shouted.
Scores of employees were delayed from reaching their workplaces on time yesterday as residents blocked the windward main road with burnt tyres and debris from as early as 8 am.
Many waved placards with the words “Free Clint” while others shouted insults at police and fire officers who had been deployed to maintain order. Some cried and others prayed for Alexis, who they said was “an innocent man”, to be released.
“The person I know is not capable of doing these crimes that they talking about. Suddenly everything that happen is Clint do it. We will protest all day to let everybody know that we believe in his innocence,” his friend, Khari Thompson told Newsday.
Another unidentified resident threw a stack of hundred dollar bills on the ground and danced around it chanting “we don’t rob people in the Gaza. We don’t chop up people here for what they have. We does take care of we own.”
And true to their word, when a Newsday team returned to the village yesterday afternoon the protestors said they had taken a break to replenish themselves with bowls of fish broth.
They vowed not to be deterred by the authorities’ move to stop their actions and warned the protest would move to Scarborough today.
Alexis’ father, Christopher, told Newsday his “head raised” when he saw the support of the residents. Christopher said he and his wife Janet were shocked their son could be accused of committing such a crime. Alexis was charged with the attempted murder of the Greenes at their vacation home in Bacolet on August 1.
Dressed in a full suit of white, Alexis’ mother, Janet, who was too distraught to attend the hearing, told Newsday she chose to stay home and pray for his release.
“I know my son is innocent. Right now my son can’t travel and go anywhere in the United Kingdom because his name is all over the international media. He doesn’t give me any kind of trouble like what people have been saying. Clint only not living with us because of the distance he would have to travel and he has to reach to work by 5 am,” she explained.
As residents pleaded for his release in Argyle, Alexis appeared before Magistrate Annette McKenzie in the Scarborough Magistrates’ Court which was packed with onlookers, including friends of the Greenes, who turned up to catch a glimpse of him. Earlier in the morning, police officers slipped Alexis past a throng of media photographers and television crews who had gathered outside the court.
Dressed in a cream pin-striped suit with his plaited hair held in one, Alexis stared blankly as his attorney Larry Williams told the court Alexis had been beaten and tricked into signing a statement of which he did not know the contents.
Williams said his client was in dire need of medical attention after officers allegedly beat him on the head with a gun butt, in the ribs with a baton and constantly mashed his injured right foot causing it to swell while in custody. He also said the medication prescribed for the injury Alexis had reportedly sustained the Thursday before the crime was committed were taken away by the officers.
When Mc Kenzie asked if he could identify the officers who had allegedly committed the act, Alexis replied through his attorney, “the Trinidad officers and them”.
Williams also told the court his client had been detained on Monday and was not fed until Thursday when an officer named Denoon brought him a meal from Royal Castle. Denoon fed him again on Friday and Alexis received his first meal from the authorities on Saturday. Williams said Alexis reportedly began vomiting on Saturday.
Williams told the court his client was duped by officers into signing a statement which had not been read by or to him. He said the officers simply told Alexis to sign the document and he would be allowed to go home. Alexis was reportedly informed thereafter that he had confessed to attempting to murder the Greenes.
“Your Honour, my client cannot read quite well and he is very anxious to know what he has signed to,” he said.
Williams also requested a copy of the statement Alexis had reportedly given to the police.
The prosecution denied the allegations stating that at no time the complainant was beaten with a gun butt or baton; that he was fed everyday and that no medication was in his possession at the time of his arrest on Monday. The prosecution also told the court Alexis had not complained of being ill anytime during his time in custody.
Mc Kenzie, however, ordered Alexis be taken to the Scarborough Regional Hospital to be examined and requested a medical report be brought to court for the next hearing on August 20. He was denied bail pending tracing.
