…after charged with two counts of misconduct in public office
Deputy Chief Elections Officer (DCEO), Roxanne Myers was granted $300,000 bail on Friday after being charged with two counts of misconduct in public office by the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court. Myers was granted bail in the sum of $150,000 for each charge to which she was not required to plead.
Though bail was objected to by State Prosecutor, Teriq Mohammed, Chief Magistrate, Ann McLennan granted the same ordering the Myers is to return to Court on October 23, 2020.
Myers’ Court appearance comes several days after she was locked up at the Beterverwagting (BV) Police Station for what the police said was alleged “conspiracy to defraud” but what her lawyers maintain was because she exercised her right to remain silent when questioned by the police.
Her arrest came after she visited the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) voluntarily, in the company of her lawyers, on Tuesday morning, after she learned that the police wanted her for questioning in relation to the 2020 General and Regional Elections.
The particulars of Myers’ charges state that she willfully misconducted herself to declare fraudulent election results between March 4-14, 2020 – in collaboration with Region Four Returning Officer (RO), Clairmont Mingo and others.
Speaking outside of the Court, one of Myers’ attorney’s Ronald Daniels said: “We wish to put on record that up to last night when we spoke to Ms. Myers, around eight o’clock last night, no such allegation was put to Ms. Myers and, as Mr. Hughes has indicated to the Court, he did not learn until about three o’clock this morning, through the media that Ms. Myers was charged and had to report to Court today. So, we had no formal communication to that effect even though we have been attending the police station quite often.”
Daniels’ report is consistent with his previous remarks in which he accused the police force of a “deliberate, and unfortunate departure from the truth” when it claimed in a press statement that Myers was not detained because she remained silent and that her lawyers were aware of her charges. However, Daniels had released a substantive verbatim record of the police interaction with Myers at the CID showing otherwise.
“No questions were asked of Ms. Myers pointing towards her participation or role in the conduct of these elections. Nothing was put to Ms. Myers in effect that she had conducted herself inappropriately during the conduct of these elections,” Daniels said, also noting that there have been no witness statements and the prosecution indicated to the court that they have not completed investigations. They requested two additional weeks to gather evidence which is why Myers must now return on October 23, 2020.
Apart from Myers, since the elections, in less than a month, the police arrested GECOM Assistants, Carolyn Mikhaik Duncan, Sheffern February, and Michelle Miller as well as supervisor during the national recount, Enrique Livan. These are apart from the Chief Elections Officer (CEO), Keith Lowenfield, Mingo, and former Health Minister and Chairperson of the People’s National Congress/Reform (PNC/R), Volda Lawrence.
Speaking outside of the Court too were GECOM Commissioners, Vincent Alexander and Desmond Trotman who said that they attended Court because the matter pertained to that of a senior officer of the Commission and they have a responsibility to stay abreast.
From his observation, Alexander said: “Here is a person being brought before the Court [and] charges were never brought to their attention until the person turns up in Court.” He said that evidence has shown that the police publicly lied that they did not state that Myers was being charged for obstruction of justice – misleading her lawyers — after she used her right to remain silent when questioned.
“This is clearly a charade that is being carried out and basically what I think they’ve attempted to do is to force Ms. Myers to give evidence in an attempt to convict others. She has not done that and what they’re doing to her is to send a message to others that if you don’t fall in line you’ll go through what Myers is going through.”
Alexander said that if one should read the Constitution, they would know that it debars the Court from entering into such matters which can only be entered into during the course of a petition. He said, too, that those who have brought private charges against Lowenfield are still unable to lay evidence in the Court and the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) continues to take over cases that she, too, cannot provide evidence to support.
The Commissioner said: “One has to ask the serious question, if the legal system, the justice system behaves this way, what next? Can citizens subject themselves to a system which clearly, clearly is imposing on the rights of people?”
