Bartering: One shot gun, two years

Four years ago Alston Harry bartered marijuana for a shotgun. Now, that shotgun has cost him two years of freedom.{{more}}

On Tuesday, April 7, 2009, Chief Magistrate Sonya Young slapped a two-year custodial sentence on the Biabou man, after he informed the court that he carried police officers to the area where he had hidden the bartered shotgun.

It was revealed that police officers from the Biabou district acted on information about the defendant in relation to the gun. Harry was met at a liquor shop and he carried the officers to a plantain field about 50 feet away from the shop and pointed them the root of a plantain tree where the gun was retrieved. Under caution by the police, Harry said: “Ah south man gimme the gun four years ago and me geh de man weed.”

Magistrate Young told Harry, 26, that he could not be given credit for the offence since he had enough time to turn over the gun to the police. Pleading his case to the court, the man, who was not represented, said that his mother is blind and he is the only one who takes care of her. “Me can’t get no office job, so me just ah try mek ah living,” Harry pleaded.

In response, the Chief Magistrate said that Harry was not considering his mother and the fact that she is blind when he got involved in illegal activities. Harry said that she was not blind four years ago. Young added that the mere fact that Harry had a gun is evidence that he had plans for it.