A murder suspect who spent five days in custody after officers from the newly formed Electronic Monitoring Unit accused him of breaching his bail condition plans to sue.
Rashad Paul, 32, was on Friday cleared of bail violation charges by Magistrate Samuel McKinney.
Prosecutors had alleged that Paul, who is wearing an ankle bracelet as a condition of his bail for the 2019 murder of Kirby Jean Pierre at Fritz Lane, failed to charge his device between September 1 and 11 of this year.
However, the prosecution’s case against Paul collapsed after Alvardo Rahming, a technician from Metro Security, the company tasked with monitoring suspects on bail, admitted during cross-examination by attorney Bjorn Ferguson that Paul’s device was defective.
Rahming said he examined Paul’s device while he was in custody and found that the charger wasn’t working properly. As a result, Rahming said he changed the bracelet and charger. Despite this, police still charged Paul with failing to charge his tracking device.
After hearing Rahming’s evidence, McKinney dismissed the case.
Paul faced a potential maximum sentence of five years’ imprisonment coupled with a $50,000 fine if convicted of breaching his bail conditions.
As a result of the dismissal, Paul intends to sue the attorney general, the Royal Bahamas Police Force and Metro Security for unlawful arrest, false imprisonment and malicious prosecution, Ferguson said.
In recent months, police have cracked down on persons accused of breaching their bail conditions. In some instances, people have been arrested for breaching their curfew months after the movement restrictions were removed.
