Bennett v Regina [2006] SBHC 94; HCSI-CRC 314 of 2006 (27 October 2006)

HIGH COURT OF SOLOMON ISLANDS

Criminal Case No. 314 of 2006

SUGAR RAY BENNETT

-v-

REGINA

(Mwanesalua, J.)

Hearing: 5 October 2006
Ruling: 27 October 2006

M. Swift for the Applicant
R. Iomea for the Respondent

RULING

Mwanesalua, J: This is an application for bail pending trial. The Applicant is Sugar Ray Bennett. The victim was Bobby Sae Nare. The Applicant was charged with other persons for the murder of the victim on 11 June 2000.

This court can only grant bail to accused in case of murder in exceptional circumstances. Advocate for the Applicant submits that there is an exceptional circumstance in this case for this court to grant bail to the Applicant. That exceptional circumstance is the weakness in the evidence against the Applicant for murder. Advocate for the Respondent opposes the application on the basis that the Applicant was charged with a very serious offence. He asserted that the Applicant was a member of a group called the "Black Sharks", which short the victim with a firearm at Gizo.

The victim lived with her parents on Simbo Island in June 2000. He came to Gizo on 8 June. He slept with John, Graciano, Freda and Lorrinda in a room at a workshop at Gizo on the night of 11 June 2000. The Security light in the workshop illuminated the room. A group of men entered the room during the night. Some of the men were armed with firearms. A member of the group shot the victim with a firearm. He died a short time later from a wound which he received on his head.

Lorrinda gave her first statement to the Police on the incident on 11 June 2000. This was the day that the men shot the victim. Her story was that she was awake when the men came into the room. They were men from Bougainville. She heard the sound of a gun shot, but she did not know who was being shot at. One of the men walked to the place where she was and kicked her on the backside. After that she left the room she did not recognize the men who came into the room.

Five years later, on 14 August 2005, she gave her second Statement to the Police. In that Statement, among other things, she gave names of five Bougainvillians who were in the group, their descriptions, the colour of the guns they were armed with, the nature of the assaults which they inflicted on John, Freda and herself. It was in this Statement that she mentioned that she recognized the Applicant with the group of men who shot the victim. It took her five years eight months, to tell the Police in her fourth Statement on 9 February 2006, the description of the Applicant and the evidence that she knew the Applicant well before the incident occurred.

Her first Statement was given to the Police in the morning of 11 June 2000. This was the day when the victim was shot. That Statement was made after she returned to the scene of crime. Her memory regarding the names and descriptions of the men who shot the victim, and their assault on John, Freda, Graciano and herself would still be fresh in her mind. But she told the Police that she did not recognize the men, including the Applicant, whom she claimed to have known well before the incident. She was only able to remember the Applicant, being amongst the men who shot the victim, five years after the event. This is unusual as memory fades with lapse of time after an event. There is merely one piece of direct evidence against the Applicant at this present time. That evidence, as I alluded to above, is that Lorrinda saw the Applicant amongst the men who shot the victim.

This evidence emerged five years after the victim was shot and killed. It is bare and lacked detail. There is no evidence that the Applicant is a member of the Black Sharks. The assessment on the reliability of this evidence is an issue to be considered by the trial judge at the appropriate time. The tasks at hand are limited to deciding the strength of the evidence against the Applicant and whether this court should grant bail to him. The view of this court is that there is little evidence against the Applicant at the moment. This court will thus exercise its discretion to grant bail to the Applicant with conditions.

The Applicant is released on bail on the following conditions:

1. He is to deposit one thousand dollars cash in the High Court before he is released from Rove Prison.

2. He is to reside in Honiara at an address acceptable to the Prosecution.

3. Not to leave Honiara whilst on bail.

4. To report to Central Police Station every Monday between the hours of 8am. and 4pm.

5. Not to contact Prosecution Witnesses directly and indirectly.

I order accordingly.

Francis Mwanesalua
Puisne Judge