Correspondent: Dead Men Tell No Tales Tx Date: 15th September 2001 This script was made from audio tape – any inaccuracies are due to voices being unclear or inaudible 00.00.02 Janine Di Giovanni Kingston, Jamaica. Another victim. Another statistic. Another man gunned down by the Jamaican security forces. 00.00.11 Mother Subtitles You don’t deserve this You don’t deserve to lose your life 00.00.22 Janine Di Giovanni Each year an average of one hundred and forty people are killed here by the police. Many of them are extra judicial. Some of the victims are criminals but others are innocent. 00.00.33 Janine Di Giovanni They are women, children and teenagers. 00.00.37 Singing 00.00.43 Janine Di Giovanni Their families are rarely compensated. Their killers are rarely brought to justice. It is the highest number of police killing in the world. 00.00.53 Janine Di Giovanni This is the story the dead cannot tell. 00.01.02 Correspondent Theme Music 00.01.11 Title Page DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES 00.01.19 Daphne Subtitles If Chewie was bad, Lord God Almighty, I would understand it, but he was the best! 00.01.26 Daphne Chewie, Chewie, Chewie, Chewie. 00.01.36 Daphne Subtitle Chewie was my best child 00.01.47 Janine Di Giovanni It’s raw for Daphne. Her son was killed a few hours ago. She was desperate to show me what had happened to him. We went to the boat yard where they worked together. 00.02.04 Janine Di Giovanni According to witnesses, police arrived looking for a man who owed them money. Angry at not finding him, the police took the wrong one. His mother had to witness what happened next. 00.02.27 Daphne Voice over I heard my child bawling; ‘Mama, Mama, Mama’. I went to his rescue and held onto him and he held onto me. We fell on the floor. They beat me and they beat him, even with a piece of iron. They tried to drag him away. I called on his boss for help. 00.02.58 Witness Voice over He held onto his mother and was crying for help. They said to him; ‘hey boy, we’re going to kill you’. 00.03.07 Daphne Voice over They hit me and pulled him away and…. I saw Bobbie Red put three shots into my child’s head. 00.03.21 Janine Di Giovanni Chewie was a father as well as a son. This is his daughter. His girlfriend is seven months pregnant. 00.03.38 Janine Di Giovanni Although Jamaica has a highly lucrative tourist industry, it is still very much a country of haves and have-nots. 00.03.44 Music 00.03.47 Janine Di Giovanni The majority of the people do not have access to justice or to the social, economic or educational benefits. 00.03.54 Janine Di Giovanni There is a kind of apartheid here. The poor are kept away from the middle classes in a parallel society. The wealthy do not have to live and die in the same way. 00.04.07 Janine Di Giovanni Jamaica has the highest murder rate in the western hemisphere. To compensate the police hit back hard, often acting with impunity. 00.04.16 Janine Di Giovanni The citizens see them more as an occupying force than as protectors. 00.04.20 Music 00.04.25 Aston CAROLYN GOMES Jamaicans for Justice Our police force has been killing an average of a hundred and fifty of our citizens a year for the last eight years. That’s an emergency. That’s fourteen, I mean fourteen hundred in eight years and in that eight years I think you can count on maybe both hands, maybe, the number of policeman that have been held accountable. It’s an emergency. It’s an emergency if one more dies. 00.04.56 Janine Di Giovanni This is Braeton. What was once a quiet, middle-class neighbourhood had changed forever. 00.05.05 Janine Di Giovanni Braeton was not known before March 14th. Now it is synonymous with terror. The quiet of this community has been shattered. 00.05.15 Music 00.05.22 Aston Reconstruction 00.05.23 Janine Di Giovanni On that night, six friends gathered to play dominoes and eat a communal supper. 00.05.28 Music 00.05.39 Janine Di Giovanni At the same time, the elite Crime Management Unit, headed by Superintendent Reneto Adams, set off from central Kingston. They were operating on a tip-off. 00.05.49 Music 00.05.56 Man 1 Voice over It was between three thirty and four. I heard a lot of noise, screaming or something like that. When I looked outside I could see that some policemen in blue had surrounded the place and they had taken the guys out of the house and had them in the pathway and was actually beating them. 00.06.20 Man 2 Voice over I could hear them crying and begging for their lives. They were crying out; ‘murder, murder’. One of the officers approached them and said; ‘say Our Father prayers’. I knew the voice of the guy who was saying the Our Father. His voice was trembling and I heard shots go off - bang, bang. I never heard the guy’s voice again. 00.06.51 Music 00.06.53 Aston Reconstruction 00.06.54 Janine Di Giovanni One of the boys, Tamoyo Wilson, was just passing by. Hearing screams he tried to help his friends. Witnesses spoke to us but only on the condition that we protected their identity. 00.07.06 Music 00.07.16 Man 1 Voice over I heard them shout after the guy. He responded saying that they were his friends. He was riding a bicycle and they threw him off the bicycle, took him around the back and shot him up. Then they took them back into the house and started shooting them up. 00.07.38 Gunshots 00.07.42 Music 00.07.44 Janine Di Giovanni At the end of the raid, as the dawn lifted, seven young men were dead. 00.07.51 Janine Di Giovanni Andre Virgo. Christopher Grant. Tamoyo Wilson. Curtis Smith. Dane Whyte. Lancebert Clark. And Reagan Beckford, the youngest, who was only fifteen years old. 00.08.11 Janine Di Giovanni Reneto Adams and his men arrived with a tip-off that one of the seven may have been involved in killing a policeman and a high school principal. 00.08.19 Janine Di Giovanni Sixty specially trained members of the unit crept up on the house. 00.08.26 Janine Di Giovanni Within hours local TV filmed the crime scene. It had become a slaughterhouse. 00.08.35 Janine Di Giovanni Despite the proximity of the seven dead bodies, the incident was a triumph for the Crime Management Unit. 00.08.41 Janine Di Giovanni The much-feared Reneto Adams, who heads the Unit, was quick with his version of events. As usual, he called it a shoot-out but the people were not so sure. 00.08.54 Reneto Adams We came here, entered the premises, many of you will have heard the gunshots, gunshots echoed from the house. We told them that we were policemen. They were told to come out, gunshots came from the windows. The police took evasive action. 00.09.19 Janine Di Giovanni Still in shock, neighbours and friends of the seven boys found the police version unbelievable. 00.09.25 Janine Di Giovanni The boys were not known as troublemakers. They had lived in Braeton all of their young lives. And inside the house the picture that was emerging did not indicate the straightforward shoot-out that Reneto Adams had suggested. 00.09.41 Janine Di Giovanni When Jamaican human rights groups and family entered the house the picture of destruction was not as simplistic as they were being led to believe. 00.09.53 Aston YVONNE SOBERS Families Against State Terrorism There was blood in the living room area where I went. It was very clear that somebody had been killed there because there was blood splattered against a wall. 00.10.10 Yvonne Sobers The greatest amount of blood where evidently young men had been killed is a room to the back of the house. There’s no way in which the bullets, unless bullets can go around corners, that the bullets could have got to that room. And it would have been highly sensitive and targeted bullets to have gone around the corner and to have found six heads. 00.10.38 Yvonne Sobers No sign of shoot-out. What we saw suggested execution. 00.10.47 Janine Di Giovanni For the families of the victims the nightmare had just begun. Not only had they lost their children but they now found that they were being painted as hardened gunmen. This was before any investigation had taken place. 00.11.03 Reneto Adams You cannot have seven gangsters as we have living here. You don’t see them going to work, you see them eating and drinking, going in and out. They are responsible based on our investigation and intelligence for many of the crimes happening in South Saint Catherine. 00.11.23 Janine Di Giovanni As first evidence started emerging there was a growing realisation that the Crime Management Unit had acted on the spot, not only as police but as juror and executioner. 00.11.37 Aston DOROTHY LAWRENCE Mother of Andre Virgo They take the law in their own hands, to go and execute those, execute them, execute them. Executioners, they are death squads. They must be a death squad. The last resort is for your gun. But the first resort for policemen out there is them guns. And they don’t try to shoot a man in the foot or disarm them; they shoot them to kill them. Even if they hold their hands up in the air and surrender them, they kill them same. 00.12.19 Janine Di Giovanni The roots of the current violence can be traced to the early seventies in the shadow of the Cold War as Jamaica was pulled apart by pro and anti-western political factions. 00.12.32 Janine Di Giovanni Eminent politicians began the dangerous process of polarisation. They went into teeming inner city neighbourhoods and began arming people to rustle up votes, increasing the political divide. 00.12.46 Janine Di Giovanni Against this backdrop, thousands of people died in shoot- outs and reprisal killings. 00.12.51 Gunfire 00.12.54 Janine Di Giovanni In the 1980 elections nearly one thousand people died. 00.12.59 Aston BRUCE GOLDING Political Analyst The guns were introduced as a part of the political weaponry and gangs were armed to defend territory, to deprive competing political forces from the opportunity to campaign. 00.13.18 Gunshot 00.13.19 Bruce Golding The political leadership has embraced them for political reasons but as a price of that embrace, as a price of the political service that they give they have had to give them a great deal of legitimacy and cede a great deal of authority, unofficial though it is. 00.13.35 Janine Di Giovanni Violence erupted on an epic scale. In addition drug trafficking soared. Unable to control the gangs the police suppressed them and very openly operated outside of the law. 00.13.50 Aston CAROLYN GOMES Jamaicans for Justice We had the Suppression of Crimes Act which gave the police extraordinary powers of arrest and detention without charge, of search without warrant and that Suppression of Crimes Act remained in force for close on twenty years before it was repealed. So there was an entire generation of policemen that gave up, that grew up in the force not having to respect people’s rights. 00.14.20 Janine Di Giovanni The reality of Jamaica was becoming more transparent. 00.14.24 Janine Di Giovanni If one did not die by the gang wars, one might die at the hands of the police. To a majority of Jamaicans, who did not see a way of fighting back against the security forces, justice simply did not exist. 00.14.43 Janine Di Giovanni But Braeton has changed that. For the first time families have become more unified in challenging police and refusing to be silent. 00.14.58 Janine Di Giovanni Reneto Adams is not giving interviews anymore. We managed to catch him outside his office. He was cautious but unrepentant. 00.15.10 Reneto Adams The circumstances that are taking place where criminality is concerned in Jamaica at this time make it, you know, untenable and you know difficult decisions to be made and we have to make decisions. We have to make rather decisions when certain circumstances confront us and it creates problems for the Force, sometimes for the public. But we have a job to do, we will continue to do it. 00.15.48 Janine Di Giovanni That’s what Reneto Adams says. But for families of the growing number of victims that is a threat rather than reassurance. 00.15.57 Janice Allen’s Mother I am here on behalf of my thirteen year old daughter who has been gunned down in Trench Town by the police. We don’t want the police to come and gun down our children like this, cold-blooded. We are tired of it now; we can’t take it anymore. Our children have been gunned down, no truth about it, we can’t get any justice about it so we need justice and we need for the bad police to go and the good police stay. 00.16.23 Janine Di Giovanni This is Trench Town where Janice Allen and her family scratched out a living raising chickens. 00.16.30 Janine Di Giovanni Born here means a life of misery and repression. 00.16.34 Janine Di Giovanni In April 2000 Janice’s sister Vanessa was walking with her when fighting broke out on the streets. 00.16.42 Vanessa The police come round so and some come from so and they started the firing. He was standing like over there, right where you see that jeep, he was standing like somewhere over there. I would say that like he stopped fire for a minute and she get up and run off, run off in this direction. 00.17.05 Music 00.17.06 Aston Reconstruction 00.17.13 Vanessa She run off and I heard like when she got shot. 00.17.16 Gunshot 00.17.18 Vanessa She turned to me and said; ‘Vanessa, I got shot’. He shot her right here. And she was bleeding in her back and she had some bleeding right around here, so I put my arm around her and I started to … she was bleeding from her nose and her mouth. 00.17.42 Janine Di Giovanni The police refused Vanessa’s pleas to take her bleeding sister to the hospital. She was finally helped by a passer- by. 00.17.57 Passer-by Voice over I heard gunshots. I ran and saw a little girl who had fallen. So I picked her up and called one of my friends with a car. We put her in the car. She died on the way to hospital. 00.18.16 Janine Di Giovanni Tributes from Janice’s friends. In childish poems, sketches and letters, the senselessness of her young death is portrayed. 00.18.26 Vanessa This is the policeman who shoot Janice and this was Janice and this is me. It says; ‘Sorry Janice but let your soul rest in peace’. This was the policeman who killed her. This one was, they draw it like it was an example how she got died, got shot and died. This one is from her next friend. Our family crying and with tears in their eyes from she died, this is the way how we feel. 00.19.07 Janine Di Giovanni More than one year on the case is still painfully unresolved. The policeman who shot Janice has been released on bail and our meeting with the Chief Police Commissioner Francis Forbes was not reassuring. 00.19.20 Janine Di Giovanni Let’s move to Janice Allen. 00.19.23 Francis Forbes I don’t recall that case. 00.19.24 Janine Di Giovanni Well I’ll refresh your memory. She’s a thirteen year old girl who went out to buy rice and was shot in the back. Any comments on that? 00.19.35 Aston FRANCIS FORBES Chief Police Commissioner I… if the case is the one that I am recollecting correctly, a policeman is charged now and is before the court. 00.19.46 Janine Di Giovanni Not yet no. I think the family’s been intimidated. 00.19.49 Francis Forbes No, no, no, no. 00.19.50 Janine Di Giovanni And then they were offered the witness protection plan. 00.19.52 Francis Forbes No, no, no, no. 00.19.55 Aston CAROLYN GOMES Jamaicans for Justice I’m amazed actually because it was just over a week ago that we were sitting with Commissioner Forbes, Janice’s mother in his office talking about the continuing harassment of that family and he was the one that made the offer of witness protection for her. 00.20.14 Janine Di Giovanni Janice Allen cannot be a witness anymore. She will never give evidence for her own case. This is the story for so many and so justice cannot be served, there are too few who survive police bullets. 00.20.30 Janine Di Giovanni Katchroy MacLeash doesn’t walk so well these days. Nine months ago he could. 00.20.38 Janine Di Giovanni Following a shoot-out outside his house where he took a stray bullet, his life changed radically. Not only was his left leg shattered but he was charged with possessing an illegal firearm and shooting at a policeman. It is a charge he vehemently denies. 00.20.56 Katchroy MacLeash I was just lucky the night I got shot that my friend and my brother was there so they couldn’t put a gun on me. But they’re still telling lies you know, defend themselves saying I was shooting at them. That weren’t true. It was just a lie. 00.21.16 Janine Di Giovanni Despite the lack of evidence the police are pressing charges. And Katchroy was called again to a second court after being absolved from the first one. He is now awaiting another trial. 00.21.30 Janine Di Giovanni We found the police observations sketchy. This is a witness who had been there the night Katchroy was shot. 00.21.38 Janine Di Giovanni Did you see Katchroy with a gun? 00.21.41 Witness No, he didn’t have any gun. 00.21.44 Janine Di Giovanni So he didn’t shoot at the police. 00.21.45 Witness No, he did not shoot after the police. 00.21.48 Janine Di Giovanni So they’re accusing him of something he didn’t do? 00.21.51 Witness Yes they’re accusing him wrongfully. 00.21.56 Janine Di Giovanni Meanwhile his life and his work are on hold and he is still coping with the trauma of his injuries. 00.22.03 Katchroy MacLeash The cut is about sixteen inches. The bullet entered through here and exit through here causing to shatter the bone in my legs. So I have a sixteen plate iron, sixteen inch long bolt on to my leg, to the bone. 00.22.27 Janine Di Giovanni Katchroy symbolises all that is wrong with Jamaican justice. A crime he did not commit, an accusation that destroys his name and reputation and the frustration of a lagging legal system. It’s a typical scenario. 00.22.45 Janine Di Giovanni He refuses to be intimidated. 00.22.49 Katchroy MacLeash I saw the policeman who saying I was shooting at them. And even when I go court and see him he can’t look in my face, he just and I just keep on looking at him. I can’t forget the man who is telling lies on me. I think they are just sorry that they didn’t get to kill me. But if they did they have a saying; ‘dead man tell no tales’. So, they would get away if I was dead. 00.23.19 Janine Di Giovanni In Braeton, three months after the killings, the families of the seven victims struggle to come to terms with grief. There is still little sign of co-operation between police and community. 00.23.32 Janine Di Giovanni No evidence against any of the boys has emerged. And the families are forced to see their children, dead and unable to defend themselves, assassinated again. 00.23.44 Aston YVONNE SOBERS Families Against State Terrorism One of the really difficult things for the families to cope with is the ravaging of the children’s reputation and by inference the ravaging of the parent’s reputation. 00.23.58 Yvonne Sobers They, the young men, have been branded as criminals and every, every wrong thing that perhaps has ever happened in the community or outside of the community to the people, the young men have been branded. It’s scapegoating of the young men. 00.24.17 Janine Di Giovanni The longer it drags on the more traumatic it is for families. 00.24.21 Janine Di Giovanni Reagan Beckford was fifteen, the youngest of the group. He sustained nine gunshot wounds. Without proper answers it’s hard for his mother to find peace. 00.24.31 Aston VALDINE BECKFORD Mother of Reagan Beckford I keep on saying to myself; ‘why, why, you know, why Reagan you know?’ Reagan was not a person that give trouble. He was so quiet, he was so, I was so close to him, you know. Much as he was a big boy I call him my baby. Why him? I keep asking myself the same question everyday, everyday – why? Why my son? 00.25.29 Janine Di Giovanni This was Tamoyo Wilson’s garden. He was the boy on the bicycle, the one who simply was at the wrong place at the wrong time and who died for that. 00.25.43 Janine Di Giovanni His father Leonard is channelling his anger and grief into fighting against Reneto Adams and the Crime Management Unit. 00.25.50 Janine Di Giovanni He believes the most painful thing is that his son is being branded a hardened gunman. 00.26.00 Aston LEONARD WILSON Father of Tamoyo Wilson The police, up until today, has no record of him, with them in a criminal record and they have no notation of him being involved in any wrong. He was not suspected of doing any wrong. So they couldn’t have come for my kid, they couldn’t have come for my child as any hardened gun-slinging criminal. 00.26.29 Janine Di Giovanni Leonard Wilson has become even closer to his neighbour, Dorsey Whyte. The two sons played together as children and died together in Braeton. 00.26.43 Janine Di Giovanni Two fathers are united in the terrible grief and loss but also in the determination that someone must be held accountable for the death of their boys. 00.26.55 Leonard Wilson I agree with you the state should take responsibility. 00.26.58 Dorsey Whyte Of course. 00.26.59 Leonard Wilson After all somebody have to. I mean it’s just awful to, for the agents of the state to kill somebody and…. 00.27.08 Dorsey Whyte Right and then nobody responsible for it. Somebody have to be responsible. 00.27.14 Leonard Wilson That some justice will come out of it. 00.27.16 Dorsey Whyte Right, right. 00.27.17 Aston DORSEY WHYTE Father of Dane Whyte As far as I understand all the guys get shot. They opened the door and they go in but they just come to kill. My son got four shots in the head, four and it’s down, like they stand up over him. Right, he get one, one in his back and one in the chest. He alone get six shots. 00.27.49 Aston NORDEL ROBINSON Aunt of Christopher Grant I saw six outside, six lying on top of one another, all had their hands up like this. The other one that is Christopher, he was in the refrigerator already but his eyes, one of his eye was shot out. I could see right through the back of his head. There was no skull at the back of his head. 00.28.23 Janine Di Giovanni This is the spot where it is believed Christopher Grant’s life ended. Like all the boys his body was mutilated. And there is new evidence. 00.28.34 Aston BARRINGTON FOX Families Against State Terrorism This is the skull of Christopher Grant, who was one of the seven killed in Braeton. 00.28.43 Janine Di Giovanni Where did you find that? 00.28.45 Barrington Fox Scattered all over the floor at the house ten hours after. 00.28.54 Janine Di Giovanni The indignity increases the pain for the families and fuels their determination for justice. 00.29.02 Janine Di Giovanni Having witnessed prior cases going unresolved or being lost in the abyss of the justice system, an independent pathologist was brought in to observe the post mortem. 00.29.14 Janine Di Giovanni His findings challenge Reneto Adams’ story that the boys had died in a shoot-out. 00.29.21 Aston Dr PETER LETH Forensic Pathologist Amnesty International All seven had received multiple gunshot wounds and it was single projectile wounds and what was striking was the many head wounds. Out of thirty-seven gunshot lesions there were fifteen to the heads. It seems not possible that this pattern of lesions could have occurred by just random shooting. 00.29.55 Dr Peter Leth I counted the number of gunshots through the aluminium shutters and the doors and there was twenty-one but there was thirty-seven gunshot lesions on the bodies. So obviously some of these lesions must have occurred in some other way than by shots through the windows and the doors. 00.30.21 Janine Di Giovanni Jamaican police are believed to be the deadliest in the world. 00.30.24 Crowd shouting 00.30.31 Man Police shot him, police. 00.30.36 Janine Di Giovanni It was created as an elite task force to mop up the most criminal elements in a violent sub-culture. 00.30.42 Gunfire 00.30.49 Janine Di Giovanni Yet, wherever Reneto Adams and his men go they leave behind a trail of bloodshed and seemingly extra-judicial killings. 00.31.00 Gunfire 00.31.03 Francis Forbes The rate of police fatal shootings in Jamaica is extremely high. 00.31.07 Gunshots 00.31.10 Aston FRANCIS FORBES Chief Police Commissioner It is too high and, you know, I have no, you know, no defence in that. I don’t want to be defensive on that. But it has to be seen in the context of the character, the attitude, the mindset and the psyche of the Jamaican gunman, criminal gunman. Because you know, we have film clips from television stations, which show gunmen openly firing at the security forces. 00.31.48 Francis Forbes We have an average of one policeman being shot and killed in the line of duty each month. An average two policemen being shot and injured in the line of duty each month. 00.32.02 Janine Di Giovanni Not many Jamaicans are comforted by the police motto. 00.32.08 Janine Di Giovanni Even the authorities seem to recognise they have a problem. 00.32.13 Janine Di Giovanni In January they embarked on a modernisation programme and asked for British help. So far it has had little effect on the force. 00.32.22 Reneto Adams Right, good morning, Superintendent Adams. 00.32.27 Janine Di Giovanni Reneto Adams still does it his own way. He is a larger than life character, both loathed and respected. 00.32.37 Janine Di Giovanni Some see him as the only man who can control the gangs and the gunmen – a kind of Dirty Harry. Others see him as a dangerous cowboy, pathological and out of control, leading killing raids and reaping more violence whilst he is trying to control it. 00.33.03 Aston YVONNE SOBERS Families Against State Terrorism You cannot solve crime by killing people, by eliminating a number of persons, taking the message to a fearful population that these are criminals when it, when indeed the criminals may be still on the street. The police have been able to kill with impunity. Young men in particular are sensing that they may not live to tomorrow, they are afraid. 00.33.38 Yvonne Sobers There are too many people who have witnessed police brutality. 00.33.46 Singing 00.33.49 Priest Thanksgiving service of the life of the last Michael St Elmer Gayle. We give thanks to God. 00.33.56 Singing 00.34.04 Janine Di Giovanni A funeral for Michael Gayle, a twenty-six year old man from a Kingston ghetto. 00.34.10 Janine Di Giovanni Michael Gayle did not die of natural causes. 00.34.14 Singing 00.34.19 Priest We must know who killed Michael Gayle and we demand it now. 00.34.24 Applause 00.34.29 Priest As long as they are breaking the law, they must be brought to justice. 00.34.34 Applause 00.34.41 Music 00.34.46 Aston Reconstruction 00.34.47 Janine Di Giovanni According to witnesses, Gayle was riding his bicycle during a curfew. He tried to pass a police checkpoint manned by nine soldiers and four policemen. 00.35.58 Janine Di Giovanni He was not successful. What happened can only be described as a use of excessive force. His mother Jenny arrived on the scene but was powerless to stop what was a brutal assault. 00.35.10 Music 00.35.13 Janine Di Giovanni His internal injuries were massive. 00.35.16 Aston JENNY CAMERON Mother of Michael Gayle They threw the bicycle up in the air and it fall on the child’s stomach, that is what break the left ribs and that is what fractured the right ribs, the right ribs fractured that when you took your hand and hold the skin, you are feeling the broken bones inside of it. And this one broken that you can push my finger go down into the hole and you’re feeling all the broken bones. 00.35.37 Music 00.35.40 Janine Di Giovanni Michael’s stomach ruptured. He was taken to a clinic but died a few days later. 00.35.45 Music 00.35.50 Janine Di Giovanni For Jenny, the manner in which her son died is the most haunting aspect of his death. Two years on she cannot forget the violent images from that night. 00.36.02 Jenny Cameron Do you know that thirteen of them beat my child with his one person to death and telling me that there is nobody held responsible for the death of him? He could not have been man over nine soldiers and four police alone without any weapon. So they can’t convince me. 00.36.30 Aston CAROLYN GOMES Jamaicans for Justice Even though the jury said that all the security force personnel at that barricade were to be held guilty of manslaughter, the DPP who is the one who now has the responsibility for taking it forward and laying the charges has refused to act. 00.36.46 Janine Di Giovanni It’s hard to charge an entire group. So all of them go free. 00.36.51 Janine Di Giovanni If you’re poor in Jamaica, if you don’t have access to power, life is cheap. 00.36.57 Jenny Cameron A little inner city woman, they don’t business because one woman that’s supposed to raise six kids alone, they figure more or less oh, why just kill one. But it’s not going to work. 00.37.15 Janine Di Giovanni Since February, this fifty-three year old who could not read or write has gone back to school. It’s her way of seeking justice, of fighting for Michael. 00.37.27 Jenny Cameron I wanted to be a lawyer. And that’s why I’m going back to school. Michael’s case opened my eyes not to sit in the dark. 00.37.41 Janine Di Giovanni A coroner’s inquiry has recently been called for the Braeton killings. It is seen as yet another delaying tactic. 00.37.50 Janine Di Giovanni It is an ominous indication that the case could, like the case of Michael Gayle’s, be buried because there is no single perpetrator identified. 00.38.00 Janine Di Giovanni In the meantime seven boys are gone, seven lives have disappeared. 00.38.06 Yvonne Sobers It now creates a problem with the Braeton seven case where they were probably between, some say forty, some say sixty policemen there. How are we going to identify which are the policemen who were in that house and killed those young men and it must be possible. 00.38.24 Janine Di Giovanni Meanwhile the sixty men that were involved in killing those seven boys are still working. 00.38.30 Aston K. D. KNIGHT Minister of National Security and Justice Well you make an assumption that sixty men were involved. The fact that sixty persons were present does not mean that sixty were involved because under British law, which is the Juris Prudence governing us, mere presence without more would not give rise to criminal culpability. 00.38.57 Janine Di Giovanni The police have learnt there is safety in numbers. 00.39.06 Aston LEONARD WILSON Father of Tamoyo Wilson I expect them to cover it with a ton of bricks, cement. So I know what we’re up against. I have no faith in them at all. 00.39.20 Janine Di Giovanni The Braeton case deepened the already vast divide between people and the police. From the very beginning the investigation process was seen as a sham. 00.39.33 Dr Peter Leth The police officers handled guns they claimed to have found in the building without using gloves. 00.39.42 Aston Dr PETER LETH Forensic Pathologist Amnesty International It has been said that the deceased had been firing guns at the police and in such cases it would be important to take samples from the hands of the deceased for gunpowder residues and this wasn’t done. I had brought with me equipment to take such samples but I was not allowed to take any. The bodies was not put in body bags, they were just rushed away. Furthermore all seven autopsies were done in a period of time of six hours and that is absolutely insufficient time to make a thorough investigation. 00.40.21 Janine Di Giovanni During the course of filming we unearthed another attempt by the police to obstruct justice. 00.40.28 Janine Di Giovanni Witnesses saw police enter the house and attempt to destroy vital evidence. 00.40.37 Janine Di Giovanni And when we compare video footage from the time of the murder to footage a few months later, the cover-up is obvious. 00.40.47 Witness Voice over The two guys that they brought scraped up the blood, scraped up everything, put it in the plastic bag and left. 00.40.53 Aston June 2001 00.40.57 Witness Voice over They came and cleaned the blood, scraped it off the floor because all of this area was soaked in blood. It started to develop maggots in it. 00.40.59 Aston March 2001 (Courtesy of Amnesty International) 00.41.07 Janine Di Giovanni This was not a general cleaning operation. This was very specific. 00.41.14 Aston June 2001 00.41.14 Witness Voice over Someone was killed in this room for the blood to splash like this on the wall. As if you got some water and you thrown it in the corner and the splash comes up and it goes that way. So it was like blood from here up on the wall. They were cleaning off this spot. 00.41.26 Aston March 2001 00.41.35 Voice over Voice over If it was a shoot-out and guys died in this room there’s no bullets coming through these windows. 00.41.44 Dr Peter Leth There’s no doubt about that it is a homicide; the question is, was it justifiable homicide or not? And as I see it these killings is extra-judicial executions and it seems quite clear that the police explanation about what happened cannot be correct. 00.42.14 Janine Di Giovanni Leonard Wilson is fighting back against the system. He has learnt the police lesson of safety in numbers and is joining forces with other parents. They’re putting pressure on the police and the justice system to carry out a thorough investigation. 00.42.32 Janine Di Giovanni Above all he wants Tamoyo and the other boys’ names to be cleared. 00.42.37 Leonard Wilson I am resolved to take it to the end unless they stop me, right, and they can only do that one way, right. But I won’t give up. I will never give up, right, until I can’t go any further. 00.42.53 Janine Di Giovanni Nor is there resolution yet for Daphne and the killing of her son Chewie. There may never be. 00.43.02 Janine Di Giovanni Judging by the sluggishness of the judicial system and more worryingly a lack of will, it will be some time before an investigation, never mind a prosecution, takes place. Which makes closure for the families extremely difficult. 00.43.18 Music 00.43.21 Janine Di Giovanni As for the future, there is a fear that there is a new generation of hate. Children’s games mirror reality. 00.43.28 Music 00.43.31 Janine Di Giovanni The lessons from Braeton may not yet be learned by the authorities but the people certainly have learned and they are determined to fight back. 00.43.39 Music 00.43.44 Voice over For more information on tonight’s programme please visit our web site at: www.bbc.co.uk/correspondent Voice over Next Tuesday at nine o’clock, a week after disaster strikes America, a Correspondent Special. 00.43.44 Credits Reporter JANINE DI GIOVANNI Camera SAM GRACEY Dubbing Mixer PHITZ HEARNE VT Editor BOYD NAGLE Graphic Design NICOLA OWEN Production Team SARAH BRODBIN NILA KARADIA JULIA DANNENBERG ANJANA SHARMA Production Manager JANE WILLEY Unit Manager IRENE OZGA Film Research NICK DODD Research YVETTE ROWE Picture Editor ROBERT MOORE Series Producer SIMON FINCH Produced & Directed by EWA EWART Deputy Editor FARAH DURRANI 00.44.05 Editor FIONA MURCH BBC © BBC MMI Voice over One day of terror. New York Witnesses. Tuesday, nine o’clock on BBC2. End BBC Correspondent 1 1