News
No Name, No Justice – Two men FREED of MURDER CHARGES as FOUR YEAR OLD case falls a part
Wilkie Arthur
Freelance Court Correspondent
#TurksandCaicos, March 21, 2024 – While the Turks and Caicos Islands and the world were caught in the crosshairs of a new killer virus, a murder plot was being hatched. Now, nearly four years later, and the verdicts are in on the two men who were charged with a heinous homicide at the start of the dreaded Coronavirus Pandemic.
The people of the island of Providenciales were shocked to hear of a deadly shooting on the dump site that left one unnamed and unidentified male dead and another seriously injured.
Police, after six months of investigations arrested and charged two men for the murder of the unidentified man who soon fell into the category of a “John Doe”.
The pair was remanded to the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (DCR) for the shooting and murder that occurred on
The trials in this matter against the accused took some three years to commence but got started on April 1st through May and concluded on June 2, 2023; spanning two months.
The first accused was found not guilty at the discretion of the trial judge on an application of no case submission by that accused man’s attorney, Mr. Oliver Smith KC. He was set free immediately.
As for the second accused, WILKENSON BEAUTE, the jury could not reach a unanimous decision on guilty, innocence, or otherwise, and the case was declared “hung.”
Later that month, on June 12th, 2023, Mrs. Nayasha Hatmin, senior public prosecutor, advised the Court that the Crown was going to retry Mr. BEAUTE.
Whenever a case is hung, the Crown can retry or withdraw the case. In this matter, it was decided to try BEAUTE once more.
The case was listed with a trial commencement date of March 4th, 2024, but at one of his pretrial review hearings (PTR) on Monday February 26th and March 1st 2024, the Crown dropped the case and BEAUTE was set free.
Explained about the sudden U-turn in the matter was the eye witnesses in the case had returned to Haiti by assistance of Immigration and Police investigators. However, when it was needed for that individual to return for the murder trial, the witness was unable to get back to the Turks and Caicos.
The lack of availability of the witness, who was no longer in the jurisdiction and the person being the Crown’s only possible link, led to the dismissal of the case against the accused WILKENSON BEAUTE.
Beaute was represented by Mrs. Lara Maroof Misick.