4 Lester Hinds/Gleaner Writer FLORIDA: A JUDGE in Florida has dismissed a charge of perjury brought against the former schools’ superintendent of Broward County, Jamaican, Robert Runcie. CIRCUIT JUDGE Martin Fein dismissed the grand jury’s 2021 indictment against Runcie agreeing with defence attorneys that state law only gives the statewide grand jury jurisdiction over crimes that occurred inmultiple counties. Runcie only testified in one. His attorneys argued that if the statewide grand jury had evidence of Runcie committing perjury it should have turned such evidence over to the Broward County grand jury or the local state attorney’s office for consideration. The judge dismissed the prosecution’s argument that the grand jury could indict for any crime involving the jury’s sanctity and integrity, saying it had no legal support. The office of Florida attorney general said prosecutors are reviewing the judge’s decision and will likely appeal his ruling. Prosecutors had contended that Runcie lied repeatedly to the grand jury when asked about the criminal case against his former technology chief. They said Runcie told the grand jury that he had not contacted anyone about the case and his only knowledge of the contract was from a presentation made earlier. The prosecutors contended that Runcie contacted others only days before he testified. Runcie and the Broward School board negotiated his resignation and a $740,000 severance package shortly after the indictment. The case against Runcie stemmed from questions over the management of a one billion-dollar bond issue and he was charged with lying to a grand jury. In its final report the grand jury had accused him of making misinformed or uninformed statements about plans to use the money for school safety in Broward County. Runcie, who was appointed Broward County schools’ superintendent in 2011, was born in Jamaica and was named superintendent of the year in 2015 by his fellow superintendents. He was arrested and charged with perjury as part of a statewide grand jury spawned by the school massacre in Parkland, more than three years ago. He was indicted on a charge of perjury in an official proceeding, a third degree felony. However, both Runcie and the district’s chief lawyer, who was also arrested on a single perjury charge, say they don’t know why they were arrested. OUTRAGE AMONG SUPPORTERS The surprise indictments just days after the grand jury meeting sparked questions and outrage among supporters of Runcie. The indictment raised claims of political influence but his critics, who have blamed him for the Parkland shooting tragedy, had cheered the indictment. The grand jury was empanelled in 2019 by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, after a teenage gunman with a semi-automatic weapon killed 17 staff and students and wounded 17 others. Agents of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement arrested the then 59-year old Runcie for testimony he gave to the grand jury on March 31 and April 1. His indictment said he gave untruthful testimony before the grand jury and listed four areas which the panel had directed its focus. The grand jury’s primary focus was to review school safety in the wake of the shooting, but it was expanded to include corruption and mismanagement in school district operations. Florida judge dismisses perjury charge against J’can former school superintendent Livern Barrett/Senior Staff Reporter A BUSINESSMAN who authored a book critical of the Jamaican judicial system that has been widely circulated locally and internationally has been ordered to pay a retired High Court judge over $80 million for defamation. THE ORDER was made in the Supreme Court last month in a lawsuit filed by Justice Roy K. Anderson, a legal scholar and retired Supreme Court judge, against Dwight Clacken over a tome the businessman penned in 2015. The book is based on a legal dispute between Clacken and his business partners, which was presided over, in part, by Justice Anderson. It was written after he waited nearly 13 years for the Supreme Court to adjudicate the dispute, which was filed in the Supreme Court in 2002, Clacken told The Sunday Gleaner. Clacken disclosed, too, that his former business partners have filed a defamation lawsuit against him over the book. That case is set for trial in 2025. StephanieWilliams, the attorney who represented Justice Anderson, called the damages awarded to her client “important”because it again sets the standard for “the contest between free speech and defamation”, which has “become prevalent in our society”. “It should serve as a reminder to the public that there are limits to free speech and that the courts will continue to protect the reputation of those worthy of protection,”Williams said. “It does not diminish the right to free speech. The case affirms the position that has always existed that when exercising our right to free speech, we must be responsible and it must be accurate and fair.” However, Clacken stood by his book, disclosing that he has already filed papers in the Court of Appeal challenging the ruling in the defamation lawsuit. “So, it doesn’t suit me to make any comments at this time,”he said, while insisting that the contents of the book are “100 per cent true”. “The Jamaican public should learn from that book and the people running the country should also pay attention to it,” he added. The book was first published in hardcopy and later distributed by global e-commerce giants Kindle, Amazon and Barnes & Nobles, according to the 46page judgment by Justice Annmarie Nembhard delivered on March 17. ‘TREMENDOUS EMBARRASSMENT AND HUMILIATION’ According to the judgment, Justice Anderson became aware of the book after he received a package from a member of the legal fraternity containing several pages from Clacken’s book. That led him to purchase a copy, he acknowledged. What he found, in complaint in the lawsuit, caused him to suffer “tremendous embarrassment and humiliation”. Citing comments made in at least five pages of the book, he argued, too, that the businessman acted with improper motive and described the publication as “high-handed and contumelious”. Anderson charged that the book was published either with the full knowledge that the disputed statements were libellous of him or with a reckless disregard as to whether they were. He said via a letter dated May 31, 2016, his attorneys wrote to Clacken demanding that he retract the defamatory material cited in the book and/or issue a public apology. But Anderson said the businessman refused both requests. Clacken, in his response to the lawsuit, said the book is a “narrative of his life experiences, including, although not limited to, his experience and encounters with the Jamaican justice system”. He argued that it was done for the“precise”purpose of highlighting the deficiencies in the justice system and inviting scrutiny of those issues. Relying on the defence of fair comment, Clacken asserted the narratives in the book are as result of his first-hand experience with and impressions of the justice system, “which are honest and truthful”. livern.barrett@gleanerjm.com Retired judge awarded $80 million in defamation case WASHINGTON (AP): US AND Mexican officials have agreed on new immigration policies meant to deter illegal border crossings while also opening up other pathways ahead of an expected increase inmigrants following the end of pandemic restrictions next week. Homeland Security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall spent Tuesday meeting with Mexico President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and other top officials, emerging with a five-point plan, according to statements from both nations. Under the agreement, Mexico will continue to accept migrants from Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba and Nicaragua who are turned away at the border, and up to 100,000 individuals from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador who have family in the US will be eligible to live and work there. Despite sharing a 1,951-mile border with the US, Mexico had been notably absent from the rollout last week of a fresh set of efforts, including the creation of hubs outside the United States where migrants could go to apply to legally settle in the US, Spain or Canada. The first centres will open in Guatemala and Colombia. The COVID-19 restrictions have allowed US officials to turn away tens of thousands of migrants crossing the southern border, but those restrictions will lift May 11, and border officials are bracing for a surge. Even with the restrictions, the administration has seen record numbers of people crossing the border, and President Joe Biden has responded by cracking down on those who cross illegally and by creating new avenues meant as alternatives to a dangerous and often deadly journey. Mexico’s support is critical to any push by the US to clamp down at the southern border, particularly as migrants from nations from as far away as Haiti are making the trek on foot up through Mexico, and are not easily returned back to their home countries. WithMexico now behind the US, plus an announcement Tuesday that 1,500 active-duty US troops are deploying south for administrative support, and other crackdown measures in place, border officials believe they may be able to manage overcrowding and other possible issues that might arise once the COVID-19 restrictions end. US, Mexico agree on tighter immigration policies at border U.S. National Customs and Border Protection Port of Brownsville held a full-scale readiness exercise at Gateway International Bridge in Brownsville, Texas Tuesday, May 2, 2023, with Federal and area law enforcement as a large influx of migrants continue to cross the Rio Grande from Matamoros, Mexico into Brownsville, Texas. AP ‘The Jamaican public should learn from that book and the people running the country should also pay attention to it.’ THE WEEKLY GLEANER | MAY 4 - JUNE 7, 2023 | www.jamaica-gleaner.com | NEWS
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