Four months after claiming that he was, for no known reason, severely brutalized by police, thirty-three-year-old Earl Meadows says he is still waiting for the matter to be officially resolved.
According to Mr. Meadows, who recently visited The Guardian for a second time, his wounds may have healed, but in his opinion, justice has not been served, as the same officers who accosted him at his Miami Street residence, are still active members of the force.
“Every time I go to the person in charge of the investigation, they tell me to go to this one and the next one. The police told me the case was referred to the tribunal, but four months has passed and I have heard nothing, no phone calls, or anything and the officers who beat me up are back on the job,” claimed Mr. Meadows.
A fed up Mr. Meadows said that Commissioner of Police, Paul Farquharson, to whom he also complained, assured him that something would be done, but todate, no action seems to have been taken.
“I even went to the officer in charge of the Central Detective Unit, Marvin Dames, and he too, told me that they would look into the matter. I am just fed up and I don’t want the police to think that I will forget about what happened,” he said.
According to Meadows, who is employed as a waiter at Atlantis, he contacted Minister of National Security and Deputy Prime Minister, Cynthia Pratt, but was referred to her secretary.
“I gave her the information on the particulars and I left my name and number, but I never got a returned phone call. I also tried to reach my MP, Glenys Hanna-Martin, but every time I call her, either she is off the island or too busy to talk. After the election and all the hype is over, I can’t even see my MP anymore. I help them when they needed help, but now I need help and they are not around,” stated Mr. Meadows.
Mr. Meadows said that it seemed as if the police want to “cover up” what has happened, thinking that with time, he would eventually forget his ordeal.
“I have a few friends that are police officers, and they have told me about a lot of inside information that happened involving police officers, which have been swept under the rug,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mr. Meadows said, it “pains” him to see the officers that brutalized him continuing to work on the streets and he eagerly wants something to be done. Since his ordeal, he is now “turned off” by police officers and tempted to take matters into his own hands.
“If something is wrong, the last person I would tell is the police, because they are not stepping up to the plate,” said Mr. Meadows.
When Earl Meadows walked into The Guardian on Tuesday, July 2, he had four visible stitches over his left eye, a swollen red eyelid and a purple mark on his left arm.
He said that the incident occurred after he left work on Friday, June 28 for his Miami Street home.
“I saw three persons, two females and a male coming down the road, but I could not determine who they were because it was dark. Even though I was in my own area, I was not taking any chances. I went back into my yard heading into the house, but I was ran down by what I then noticed was a male police officer, who had put a gun to my head. He then said, ‘Run because I want to shoot you’,” said Mr. Meadows.
Mr. Meadows said that even though he told the officers he lived on the premises where they found him, he was taken away into a police bus containing other officers who beat and kicked him about the body, while driving around to other areas before they eventually released him onto the street.
Upon leaving the bus, Mr. Meadows said, he attempted to record the vehicle’s licence number, but was run down by the driver, who had hidden his face during the bus ride. But even though he was struck down, he said, he succeeded in getting the licence plate number. He said he also recorded the badge number of one of the officers that allegedly gun-butted him while on the bus.
Stating that his injuries took some two weeks to heal, requiring him to be absent from work for some 18 days, Mr Meadows said, “My arm still bothers me now. If I am sitting somewhere cold, where there is an air-condition on, my hand still pains me.”
Up to press time on Sunday, neither Commissioner of Police, Paul Farquharson, nor Officer in Charge of Crime and Corruption, Perry Newton, could be reached for comment.
When The Guardian contacted Mr. Newton in July concerning Mr. Meadows’ allegations, he said that, “Every policeman has to stand on the high ground of integrity and brutalizing people will not be tolerated. Once this matter is investigated, it will be going to the tribunal and they will make the decision in the court.”
By Tamara McKenzie, The Nassau Guardian
