Jamaica: Man charged for robbery, blackmail over videos found in victim’s phone

St Andrew Parish Court
St Andrew Parish Court

(Jamaica Observer) A security guard, who held up a woman in downtown Kingston with a knife and stole her phone and then tried to blackmail her for sex with videos that he found on the phones, was remanded for sentencing when he appeared in the Kingston and St Andrew Parish Court last week.

Dwayne Blair, a 28-year-old resident of Waterhouse in Kingston, was remanded for sentencing on March 13, after his lawyer Michelle Thomas told the court that he was not denying the allegations on the charge of robbery with aggravation.

The court on Tuesday heard that on December 21 of last year around 10:15 pm the complainant was standing along Harbour Street waiting on someone to go on a date when someone held her from behind, placed a knife at her side and said: “Don’t move, give mi yuh phone.”

The complainant who was in fear for her life handed over her phone valued at $12,000, jumped from the man’s grasp and fell, injuring her side.

The man, however, ran off and escaped.

The complainant later called her phone and when Blair answered he told her to allow him to have sex with him and video call her or else he was going to upload videos of her on the internet.

He then asked the complainant to meet him on Duke Street and she later went to the police and Blair was caught during a sting operation with the phone in his possession.
When cautioned by the police he said: “Is a misunderstanding.”

“You rob her and then to add insult to injury you are going to foist yourself on her,” Parish Judge Maxine Ellis said to Blair after the facts were outlined.

“After all you think say she sick and mad like you to bond with you,” the judge said, “She fraid a yuh.”

“You are a taker, you like to take things that don’t belong to you,” she added.

Blair, who looked embarrassed, then replied “No ma’am.”

Judge Ellis then asked him why he never told the complainant that he liked her phone and beg her for it.

“You would be surprised to know that you might have gotten it, for some people have more than one phone,” she said.

Meanwhile, the complainant who was present in court reported that she was injured when she jumped from Blair and fell and that he has been in pain since and has not worked for the last two months.

The judge then asked her how much compensation she was seeking and she said $110,000. Blair’s mother, who asked for her son to be sent home while indicating that his son was missing him, paid over $10,000 that she had on her and promised to pay the remainder on the next date.

Blair was subsequently remanded.