DPP’s decision shakes relatives; has repercussions for other cases

The family of 79-year-old Warwick Sargeant who tragically lost his life in June 2019 as a result of the reckless driving of Dwayne Ricardo Tull, is unhappy that the Waterford, St Michael man has been allowed to “walk free”.

Now more than a year later Tull is not required to answer the more serious charge of causing Sargeant’s death by dangerous driving. He pleaded guilty last November to the lesser charges brought against him by police for driving without due care and attention and driving without reasonable consideration for others using the road.

Last week the upgraded charge of causing Sargeant’s death by dangerous driving brought against Tull in March was withdrawn by the Director of Public Prosecutions after successful argument by his legal counsel. It was determined that the upgraded charge was based on the same facts for which Tull had already pleaded guilty and had been punished. Tull was fined $400 and had his driver’s licence suspended for nine months. The ruling has not only opened a Pandora’s box for the Crown in similar cases, but has left Sargeant’s family distraught and in shock.

Today, Shawn Clarke, Sargeant’s son, told Barbados TODAY that Tull having the charges withdrawn because of a flaw in police practice was nothing more than an insult to his family and a slap in their faces. Clarke described the development as an injustice to his family.

“We are not at all satisfied with the outcome. Here it is a young man driving recklessly for no apparent reason, takes a human life, gets his licence suspended for nine months, pays the court $400 and then walks free. The family of Warwick Sargeant is not at all happy with the court ruling for allowing the young man who killed my father to walk free.

“At the end of the day, on that morning of June 11, that young man had a decision to make and he made the decision to drive recklessly and took the life of an innocent man who would have contributed to the landscape of Barbados for many years, a man who was respected by the entire community.”

The June 11 accident at the junction of 1st Avenue, Thomas Gap and President Kennedy Drive, occurred as Sargeant, of Yearwood Road, Black Rock, St Michael, a prominent barber, was riding into town on a bicycle. On November 25, Tull was charged with driving without due care and attention and reasonable consideration for other road users. Appearing before Magistrate Graveney Bannister, Tull pleaded guilty to both charges. On March 9, 2020, he was charged for causing Sargeant’s death by dangerous driving.

However, Tull’s lawyer Faith Greaves-Agard made an application to the court to have the charges halted, arguing that the police abused the process by instituting a more serious charge after her client had already pleaded guilty to lesser charges based on the same facts.

Last week, Magistrate Bannister who adjourned the matter and referred it to the Director of Public Prosecution’s (DPP) office, told Tull he was free to go, after the DPP ordered that the prosecution withdraw the charge for dangerous driving.

“He got a slap on the wrist because some persons or some department, did not pay due diligence to their job and it is a situation where we are sad and depressed. It is almost like the day that he was taken from us and we believe that to rule in that way and for us to learn about it by reading a newspaper article was a slap in the face and it is something that we are not sitting easy on.

“It is just not appropriate justice, it is just not what we expected. You are saying to me that a slap on the wrist is more important than human life. A man that has given his all to young people of Barbados and mere months after, a Magistrate is going to sit and say you are free to go. It is something that we just cannot come to grips with,” he said.

Clarke indicated that his family has scheduled a meeting to discuss the best way forward in dealing with the matter. He promised that Sargeant’s relatives would not be taking the matter lightly.

“We were hoping the law that we abide by, the law that we trust in, we were hoping that that law would have given us justice that was deserving of the offence committed by the young man, but that is not what we got.

“But the unfortunate reality is that no kind of compensation could ever replace a life. But at the end of the day there still has to be something meaningful that we could still get a level of closure.

“I am not necessarily talking monetary, but we should be able to get some kind of closure to know that the injustice that was committed against our father, that the law courts did their job and that some level of decision was made that we could be comfortable with,” Clarke said.

“We have never heard from him… not an apology. He has never reached out. Nobody from his family has ever reached out to us to say ‘we are sorry, we know what you are going through’, nothing. It was like this young man got into a vehicular accident and it was just a fender-bender and the insurance took care of it and that was the end of that,” he added. (anestahenry@barbadostoday.bb)