‘Options open’ on slapping Dudus with more charges

(Jamaica Gleaner) – Alleged drug baron Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke could be charged in connection with the attacks launched by thug loyalists on the security forces during last month’s mayhem in the Corporate Area.

Two policemen were killed and six others injured in an ambush on May 23; a soldier was slain in the early throes of the Tivoli incursion; and at least two police stations torched as militiamen sparked a bloody battle that left more than 70 civilians dead.

“We are investigating all the attacks on our members and facilities. We are investigating all the crimes that were committed on that day,” Police Commissioner Owen Ellington told journalists on Tuesday, hours after Coke was nabbed.

“All individuals are being looked at in relation to by what means they would have participated in those (attacks),” he added.

But Ellington was quick to make it clear that the police were not yet in a position to say if the man who is wanted in the United States to answer drug and gun charges would face local courts on crimes committed in Jamaica.

“We are not yet in a position to make any definitive statement as to who will be charged and for what, but we are keeping our options open,” said Ellington.

More than 15 police stations were attacked by thugs in the lead-up to the May 24 attempt by the police and soldiers to arrest Coke in Tivoli Gardens.

The Hannah Town and Darling Street police stations, also in west Kingston, were set ablaze by the criminals, while members of the police force were pinned down for more than an hour on Red Hills Road in St Andrew.

Armed men paraded with firearms openly after barricading themselves in Tivoli while declaring their determination to die for the man they called ‘The President’.