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For two months now, accused murderer, kidnapper, and conman William Danny Mason has been behind bars. He’s waiting for his day in court, after being accused of the beheading murder Pastor Lucas, and kidnapping David Dodd. In the wake of that discovery, a scandal raged about his connections to members of the Barrow Government and the senior Police Officers. It eventually led to the Prime Minister removing the Police portfolio from John Saldivar and reassigning it to Godwin Hulse.

Since then, the William Mason scandal has kind of died down, but he and his fellow defendants, Ashton Vanegas, Keron Fernandez, Terrence Fernandez, and Ernest Castillo, have been on remand at the prison. They were supposed to have been given disclosure from the police, which is basically the investigators outlining what sort of evidence they have to prove the criminal case against them.

But, with the high-profile nature of this case, the police can’t afford to get it wrong. So, they held on to the investigation file up until last week, before handing it over to the Director of Public Prosecutions. She’s still only getting an opportunity to review, what we are told is a very thick document, and so, that disclosure was not ready for today.

So, Assistant Police Commissioner Chester Williams, who is prosecuting the case at the Magistrate’s Court level, went back before Chief Magistrate Ann Marie Smith, to try to convince her to grant an adjournment. As viewers are aware, there is a new set of criminal procedure rules which tightly restricts the amount of adjournments a case can have to make sure that there is no protracted delay.

So, Williams had to carefully justify why the adjournment is needed. He succeeded, and when the hearing was concluded, we got an opportunity to speak with him about it: 

ACP Chester Williams - Regional Commander, Eastern Division South
"You all would understand that the Mason investigation is a very complex one. It is not per say an open and close investigation and as the public has been saying that they want a proper investigation to be done and the police is doing just that. And because of the nature of the investigation, the degree the police have to probe where this investigation is concerned the collection of evidence pertaining to the matter takes an extended period of time and so we are not able to get the file to the DPP until last week Friday; and again the DPP having the file last week Friday today's adjournment it would have been impractical for her to have produce the file and prepare for disclosure today. So what we did today was to basically ask the court for an adjournment and the criminal and practice and procedure rule does provide the venue where the prosecution can apply for an adjournment in certain circumstances and one such circumstance is where the interest of justice requires that the adjournment be given. In this case we are saying that the interest of justice does require that the magistrate exercise her digression in granting adjournments. Secondly the rule also stipulates the period where the timeframe in which disclosure is to be given and if you notice that in hybrid offences they give up to 16 weeks which is 4 months. This is not a hybrid offence this is an indictable matter and an indictable matter the rules states that it must be 14 days before the preliminary inquiry; we have not even set a date for PI so there is nothing to say that we would have had to provide disclosure today."

Daniel Ortiz
"Explain to us your reasons for asking that all matters be consolidated in respect to Mr. David Dodd and the deceased Pastor Llewellyn Lucas."

ACP Chester Williams - Regional Commander, Eastern Division South
"Well the main issue in that is the fact that all the matters arose from one circumstance and even as it relates to the murder of Pastor Lucas you would see that the murder charge was in Belize judicial district but the conspiracy to commit murder was in Belmopan. Now the same murder you are talking about. So we are saying let us have all the matters consolidated in Belize City magistrate court; one it will save us time, money and resources."

So, at this time, there are 3 attorneys representing the defendants: Dickie Bradley, Oscar Selgado, and Herbert Panton. They were not opposed to the adjournment, but they have requested that the Chief Magistrate give them an opportunity to be heard on Chester Williams’s request that all the charges be heard in Belize City. He wants to ensure that the case doesn’t have to travel to Belmopan for the kidnapping and conspiracy to commit kidnapping, and then to Belize City for the murder hearings.

So, are the police ensuring that they don’t mishandle this case like so many others in the past? That’s what we asked, and here’s how Williams responded:

Daniel Ortiz
"Just a while ago you got this adjournment granted under the new criminal procedure rules those were put into place to ensure that there is no prolonging of adjournments. Can you assure us that this William Mason case will not be one of those fiascos in the past where the public waits for years and nothing is done?"

ACP Chester Williams - Regional Commander, Eastern Division South
"Well I am doing my part as the person who is handling the matter from the police side and I am sure that the DPP will be doing her part as well. We must understand that the DPP is not super human. She has received the file, when she send the file back to the police she will give the police additional instructions and rightfully so. And when we get back the file with those instructions I will ensure that the police investigators carry out those instructions promptly and then in most cases she normally request that the file go back to her again and then she makes her final determination and we'll inform the prosecutor, send the matter to PI. We believe that by early next year we should have the preliminary inquiry in this matter; providing though that the evidence we have sent abroad for DNA testing results have returned to the country of Belize because all of those are critical evidence in this matter."

The case goes back to court on November 9, and we’ll tell you what happens then.