Bridgetown: Principal Crown Counsel in the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions Wanda Blair has made a call for the Evidence Act in Barbados to be amended.
Blair was prosecuting a murder case in the Number Five Supreme Court before Justice Randall Worrell, when she informed the court that the Director of Public Prosecutions had decided to offer no more evidence in the case.
She informed the court that of the 13 witnesses who give evidence, two have been deemed as hostile because they had admitted to lying in the Magistrate’s Court.
“There are some trends that are developing in the society which suggests that it is time that steps be taken to change the Evidence Act.
There are some witnesses who give a detailed account to the police of what they saw, but by the time they get to the Magistrate’s and High Courts they have changed their story”, Blair said.
In response, Justice Worrell said that the trend was a cause for concern and was particularly worrying especially in serious matter were young people have been killed in the prime of their lives.
He added that it is sad that young men in particular give statements to the police indicating what they had seen, and then come to the court and change their story.
