Trinidad: Man accused of burning child gets bail

(Trinidad Guardian) A Mara­bel­la man, ac­cused of burn­ing the hands of a three-year-old boy and hit­ting him, was warned to have no in­ter­ac­tion with the in­fant as he was grant­ed bail yes­ter­day.

Mar­cus John, who has been in cus­tody for more than a month, was grant­ed $60,000 ap­proval bail with a cash bail al­ter­na­tive of $15,000 when he reap­peared in the San Fer­nan­do Mag­is­trates’ Court.

He was al­so warned to stay 150 feet away from the child. The two charges al­leged that on a date un­known in De­cem­ber 2018 and in March 30 this year, he as­sault­ed a child in a man­ner like­ly to cause him phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al suf­fer­ing.

John was not asked to plead to the in­dictable charges laid un­der the Chil­dren’s Act by WPC Nicole St John of the Child Pro­tec­tion Unit.

It is al­leged that the child’s hands were held over the lit stove and he was struck in the eye and hit with a ruler on his mouth for be­ing un­able to write a let­ter of the al­pha­bet.

One month af­ter his first ap­pear­ance, his preg­nant com­mon-law wife Crys­tal Marchan was al­so charged by St John.

The two charges against her al­leged that be­tween De­cem­ber 18 and March 30, Marchan, who was re­spon­si­ble for the child, ex­posed him in a man­ner like­ly to cause suf­fer­ing to his phys­i­cal health, con­trary to the Chil­dren’s Act, Sec­tion 4 (1).

She plead­ed not guilty and was grant­ed $20,000 bail and or­dered to re­port to the po­lice sta­tion every Sat­ur­day.

Yes­ter­day, John’s at­tor­ney Sub­has Pan­day re­newed his ap­pli­ca­tion for bail, sub­mit­ting to First Court Se­nior Mag­is­trate Jo-Anne Con­nor that he has been in cus­tody since April 22.

Pan­day said John had two mat­ters pend­ing in the Port of Spain High Court.

The mag­is­trate in­quired from Seedan about the child’s where­abouts. He told her the boy was stay­ing with a rel­a­tive. The mat­ter was ad­journed to June 18.