SOURCE: CMC – The trial of the woman accused of wounding Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves is set to begin Wednesday, but up to Tuesday no evidence had been disclosed to her defence team – two weeks after the court’s deadline to do so expired – and her lawyers believe the charge will be withdrawn.
Annamay Lewis, a 56-year-old vendor, of Layou, is scheduled to be tried on Wednesday on a charge that on August 5, in Kingstown, she wounded Dr. Gonsalves. She was arraigned on August 9, and the court ordered disclosure by August 31, and set September 15 for trial.
Lewis was re-arrested and arraigned, on September 8 on a charge that, on the same August 5, she threw missiles to the danger of persons who were present. The court ordered disclosure by September 13 and set trial for that charge for September 15.
However, her lawyers, Kay Bacchus-Baptiste and Israel Bruce, told a press conference in Kingstown, on Tuesday, that they had only received disclosure in relation to the throwing of missiles charge.
“I am predicting, today, publicly, that the state will drop the charge against Annamay Lewis for wounding Dr. Gonsalves,” Bruce told the press conference.
He made reference to a video, which shows a woman, resembling Lewis, apparently throwing an object under the White Chapel Road gallery of the Building and Loan Association building, in Kingstown.
Bruce confirmed that the video has been disclosed to the defence.
“But that is in connection to the charge of throwing missiles, not in connection to the charge of wounding Dr. Gonsalves,” the lawyer said.
“So we want persons to understand when you’re out there and you’re sucking up the social media story, understand what they are seeking to do. They’re trying to distract, and the media must know it and put it out there.”
The lawyer said that the “video was put out there to try to give the impression to the people of this country that ‘here is the smoking gun, here is the evidence that Annamay Lewis is the culprit to injure Dr. the Honourable Ralph Gonsalves, Prime Minister of this country’.”
“The charge that they’ve brought for throwing missiles, that is the charge that they will proceed against her on. I am predicting that. Why? Because they know there is no evidence for them to make out the charge and lead against Ms. Lewis. None. And I know that there are those who will continue the condemnation.
“That video does not bear out the charge that she, Annamay Lewis, was the person who caused the injury to Dr. Gonsalves. But, mark what I said and you follow it down the road,” the lawyer said.
Meanwhile, Bacchus-Baptiste, the senior counsel on the legal team, agreed with her junior’s prediction and confirmed the only disclosure of the second charge, “a very minute offence that carries a maximum of three months”, had been submitted by the prosecution.
“We are not going to allow them to manipulate our system. We are not going to allow them to bring on this minute charge and think they’re going to proceed with this…. In the main matter, which she was charged with and kept in prison for four nights, not a single disclosure, even though the court ordered disclosure by the 31st,” she said.
“We must not let them get away with it. They think that they’re going to now push that charge in your background, because their plot has been exposed. They were only going to want her confession and find her guilty, but now they know they can’t just bring the confession. So they’re going to — I want to take what Bruce said, I want to predict that too — push this one.
“…. But I want the public to realise that the main reason that they took Annamay up and lost in prison for four nights, they have not yet given us disclosure. And we’re not going to allow them to manipulate the system,” Bacchus-Baptiste insisted.
