Colwyn Harding baton rape… Justice Kennard recommends criminal charges for two cops

- disciplinary action for senior ranks

Chairman of the Police Complaints Authority (PCA), Justice Cecil Kennard, has finally advised that two police ranks be criminally charged for assaulting Timehri resident, Colwyn Harding.

Cecil Kennard

Justice Kennard gave his decision yesterday after months of reviewing the file on the matter which has been the subject of widespread media coverage since early this year.
While the PCA Chairman did not name the two policemen, it is believed that one of them would be the corporal who allegedly assaulted Harding with a baton while he was in custody last year November, causing him to suffer life threatening injuries, which required corrective surgery in Jamaica.
He also did not disclose if the criminal charges have anything to do with the alleged sodomy of Harding or whether they are merely for a simple assault.
Justice Kennard also advised that disciplinary action be taken against several other ranks including senior officers who were in some way linked to the incident.
Kennard has since sent the file to the head of the police criminal investigations who will then forward it to the Director of Public Prosecutions for her advice.
In January, Harding’s mother opened a Pandora’s Box when she sought justice for the 23-year-old man who accused a policeman at the Timehri Police Station of pushing a condom covered baton up his anus in November 2013. At the time he was arrested on suspicion of break and enter and larceny.
Colwyn Harding who was at the time a prisoner having been remanded for allegedly assaulting the cop and resisting arrest had to be hospitalized. He sustained a ruptured intestine.
In a recorded interview that was done at his bed bedside at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, which was later played for the media by his mother Sharon, Harding claimed he was brutalized in front of his girlfriend.
“They keep beating me, beating me and asking me to answer questions that I don’t know anything about. Then in front of an inspector and Corporal, he started to tell me he got to bugger me tonight! When I start behave bad and tell he that he can’t do that, he beat me and I get blackout, and they throw water on me and wake me up.”
He further related, that policeman then pulled out a condom from his rear pocket and placed it on his baton and began jabbing him on his rear.
Adding that he then requested from another policeman to borrow his cell phone to contact his mother, he said that his mother was alarmed after learning of the incident. He was eventually placed in the lock ups.
The man’s mother explained that her son eventually had surgery after it was discovered that his intestine was damaged, which she insists was a result of the police brutality and misuse of the baton.

Colwyn Harding

It was only after the media highlighted the story, resulting in massive public outcry that an intense investigation was launched.
The investigations took several weeks then months with the file going back and forth from the Police Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR), which was conducting the probe, to the desk of the chairman of the PCA to the DPP’s office.
In April the DPP had indicated that she had sent back the file to the police recommending further investigation since there were some loopholes.
The police OPR was asked to get statements from other witnesses since it was vital for the DPP in making her final recommendations.
There was much unease in society with respect to the investigations into the matter and many persons believed that the police were deliberately delaying the investigation to protect their own.
All eyes are now on the DPP who is expected to give her advice very soon.