(Trinidad Guardian) A Guyanese national, who was accused of assaulting a store clerk after she failed to repair his cellphone, changed his plea to not guilty and was granted bail in the sum of TT$15,000 yesterday. Ather Fraser, 28, of St Vincent Street, Tunapuna, was charged with assaulting the woman at New City Mall, Independence Square, Port-of-Spain, on April 30. Fraser first appeared before Chief Magistrate Marcia Ayers-Caesar in the Port-of-Spain Eighth Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday and pleaded guilty on the advice of his attorney.
At the time, the court heard, Fraser, who has been living in Trinidad for the past four years, had hit the complainant with a plastic chair, after he became frustrated that his phone had not been repaired. Remanded on Wednesday for tracing, Fraser reappeared yesterday and offered the court an explanation in his defence, after he fired his lawyer. He denied hitting the woman. He said he intended to hit the woman’s husband, after the man threw his cellphone on the ground causing it to fall apart. Fraser said the chair struck a lightbulb in the store and the woman sustained injuries as a result.
