Court Orders Compensation in Long-Delayed Death by Dangerous Driving Case

Frustrated by the long time it took for a death by dangerous driving matter to reach the High Court, Justice Carlisle Greaves ordered the two St John men who struck and killed a cyclist almost 13 years ago to pay his family $10 000 in compensation rather than a fine to the court.

Earlier this month, Kemal Wendell Dione Quimby of Glebe Land, and Tristan Theo Alleyne of Society Hill, were arraigned in the No. 3 Supreme Court and pleaded guilty to causing the death of Adrian Hoyte of Mount Friendship, St Michael by driving their motor vehicles on Glebe Land Road, St George at a speed and in a manner dangerous to the public, on September 4, 2011.

Both the State and defence submitted that a $5 000 fine be paid by each of the men.

However, Justice Greaves voiced his disapproval of funds being placed in the State’s coffers, because of the delay.

“The thing is that the $10 000 the two of them will now pay goes to the State. For what?! The State doesn’t deserve a dime in this case. This should be going to the victims and I really have a problem putting this money in the Treasury with people being unfaired like this – both the victims and the accused,” he stressed, later adding “I cannot in my conscience give one dime to the State in this circumstance.”

Pointing to the Needham’s Point Declaration on Criminal Justice Reform adopted by several regional countries in 2023, the judge highlighted the portion which states that “as a rule, trials should be held within one year of the accused being charged for indictable offences and six months for summary offences. During the necessary transitional stage to this ideal, trials should be held within two to three years of the accused being charged for indictable offences and twelve months for summary offences.”

Justice Greaves said: “This case is 13 years old and breaches every one of those ideals. It is the kind of case that is ripe for dismissal for breach of the defence’s constitutional rights of a fair trial within a reasonable time. There is nothing reasonable about a case coming to trial 13 years after the event in a matter such as this. This is a simple case that should be disposed of within months, if not weeks, of the event.

“Cases like these have serious repercussions on people…. They have had this hanging over their heads all of this time. What can be fair about that? And if the case is dismissed because of this unreasonable delay, in a case of offences where the two of them were arguably frolicking with danger on a dark road in the countryside in the middle of the night, chasing one another, resulting in the death of an innocent man, how is that going to be justice to (the deceased) and his family?” he argued.

The High Court judge ordered Alleyne and Quimby to pay compensation of $5 000 forthwith to the court. He said these funds would be held and paid to Hoyte’s estate. The matter will be reviewed on September 27.

Giving a brief outline of the facts, Principal State Counsel Neville Watson said that police went on duty to Valley Land Road in St George around 4:15 a.m. and saw two motor cars, which appeared to have been involved in a collision, on the left-hand side of the road facing Glebe Land. Both vehicles had damages. Police also saw Hoyte’s body in a pool of blood.