BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - A 19-year-old female resident of St. Johnson Village was yesterday (Aug. 12) placed on a nine-month bond for dealing a police officer a blow to his chest.
Nyala Hazel, charged with battery, appeared yesterday in the Basseterre Magistrate’s Court before Her Worship Simone Bullen-Thompson and was found guilty of the offence.
Hazel was told to keep the peace for nine months and should the court’s order be violated, she would have to pay a fine of EC$1 000.
According to the evidence presented in court, at about 3:45 p.m. on Wednesday, April 13, 2011, while three members of the Royal St. Christopher and Nevis Police Force were escorting Kelroy Hazel and Jabari Bart to a police patrol vehicle in the vicinity of Her Majesty’s Prison on Cayon Street, Hazel and a number of other persons were shouting in protest to the arrest of the two men who are said to be her relatives.
The court was told that after the two men had departed under escort of two officers in the police patrol vehicle, the other officer was returning to the Basseterre Police Station when he heard one person who was among the group with Hazel shouted, “All you police doing a lot of @x#+%.”
The court was also told that while the officer was walking easterly on the sidewalk opposite the police station, an unidentified female, who was approaching him in the company of Hazel, shouted, “You CID doing wrong things.”
The court was further told that the officer was walking in the centre of the sidewalk but as Hazel and her companion got closer to him, he stepped to the northern side. Hazel however veered towards her right and struck him in his chest with her right shoulder.
The officer claimed that he was knocked off balance and he “felt a sharp, intense pain in my left chest” which lasted for a few minutes.
On the following day, the officer, in the company of another constable, visited Hazel at her St. Johnson Village home and reminded her of the incident to which she reportedly said, “Me nah remember.”
The officer reportedly told Hazel that she would be summoned for the offence of battery on police, and she replied, “Well you will have to summons all of us, because all you doing a lot of wrong things.”
