The Tribune

By LYNAIRE MUNNINGS

Tribune Staff Reporter

lmunnings@tribunemedia.net

A MURDER prosecution that has dragged through the courts for nearly a decade has been stopped after a Supreme Court judge condemned the unexplained eight-year wait for a pathologist’s report and found that the delay had materially impaired the accused man’s prospects of receiving a fair trial.

Justice Dale Fitzpatrick stayed the prosecution of Terry Sweeting, ruling that his constitutional right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time had been breached after a net wait of about nine years and two months for trial — more than six years beyond the three years Parliament has deemed reasonable under the Bail Act.

Sweeting was arrested on March 29, 2017 and charged two days later with the murder of Leslie Rolle Jr, who prosecutors allege was killed in the context of the illegal drug trade in New Providence.

His trial was most recently scheduled for February 27, 2027, just under ten years after his arrest. However, Justice Fitzpatrick found there was no evidence that the case was unusually complex or otherwise justified taking longer than the three-year benchmark.

The judge placed particular weight on the prosecution’s failure to provide the pathologist’s report for Rolle until June 11, 2025, more than eight years after Sweeting was arrested.

“The delay in providing the pathologist’s report in this case is without explanation and completely unacceptable,” Justice Fitzpatrick said.

He said the prosecution had been stalled for the eight years it took to produce the report, followed by additional time while prosecutors decided whether they would continue the case. He also said the failure to provide pathology reports on time has been a recurring source of delay in criminal cases in The Bahamas.

The case had repeatedly been scheduled for trial only to be postponed while the report remained outstanding.

An August 2019 trial date was vacated for that reason. The report was still outstanding when subsequent trial dates in 2022, 2023 and 2024 were abandoned.

In September 2024, then-Justice Hilton fixed May 26, 2025 as a new trial date and made it peremptory against the prosecution. When the case came before Justice Fitzpatrick in April 2025, prosecutors acknowledged that the report remained outstanding and was necessary for the trial to proceed.

It was still unavailable during court appearances on May 1, May 8 and May 23. The May 26 trial was ultimately vacated after Sweeting’s lawyer advised the court that he intended to bring a constitutional challenge.

The prosecution later argued that the case could proceed without the report because Sweeting denied involvement in the murder and prosecutors could rely on Rolle’s death certificate.

Justice Fitzpatrick rejected the suggestion that the report was irrelevant, saying it could contain information important to Sweeting’s defence, including the location and number of injuries, the force used, their direction and the proximity of the assailant.

“Simply said,” the judge said, “the detailed information provided in the Pathologist’s Report could be used by counsel for an accused to challenge the narrative and memory of prosecution witnesses.”

He said that potential relevance becomes more significant as time passes and witnesses’ memories fade.

Justice Fitzpatrick found that Sweeting had been diligent in trying to have the case heard. He retained counsel without delay, attended the numerous court dates with few exceptions and accepted the trial dates offered by the court.

“There is not one instance,” the judge said, “where the Applicant objected to an otherwise available trial date or where a set trial date was adjourned at the behest of the Applicant.”

Justice Fitzpatrick deducted about nine months from the overall period because of the time Sweeting took to file his constitutional application, reducing the gross period of nine years and 11 months to a net period of nine years and two months.

Although Sweeting has been on bail since 2018, the judge found that the prolonged proceedings had caused him real prejudice.

Sweeting had repeatedly been required to attend court and pay his lawyer, while his family, social and work life were disrupted. Justice Fitzpatrick said he had also carried the allegation of murder and the uncertainty surrounding the case for years, as well as the stigma of being accused of murder in New Providence.

The passage of time also raised concerns about the prosecution’s witnesses.

Prosecutors have 17 witnesses, including Godfrey Dean, who gave police a statement on March 30, 2017 alleging that he witnessed the murder and Sweeting’s involvement.

Justice Fitzpatrick said there was no current statement from Mr Dean or other material before the court showing that prosecutors had recently contacted him to confirm he was willing to participate in a trial or could still recall the events of 2017.

The judge said it was common sense that memories deteriorate over time and found that proceedings lasting more than nine years gave rise to a presumption of prejudice.

“There is no meaningful doubt,” he said, “that the memories of all 17 of the prosecution witnesses, including the respondent’s primary witness Mr Godfrey, will have frayed, at least to some degree, over the past decade.”

Two men originally charged alongside Sweeting also died while the case remained before the courts.

Kenrick Riley died on June 30, 2020, while Philano Williams died on August 23, 2023. Prosecutors had alleged that Sweeting acted in concert with the two men in Rolle’s murder.

Despite the delays and deaths, prosecutors maintained that they had a viable case and intended to rely on Dean’s eyewitness identification evidence.

Justice Fitzpatrick said the prosecution offered no evidentiary basis for its assertion that Sweeting could still receive a fair trial.

“A timely trial that takes place while evidence is available and undiminished, including the memory of witnesses, is the foundation of a fair trial,” he said.

“The Applicant’s trial has been anything but timely.”

The judge found that the prosecution’s delay had “materially impaired” Sweeting’s prospects of receiving a fair trial and described the net nine-year timeframe and six-year delay as extraordinary.

“The extraordinary delay and absence of explanation direct that a stay be granted,” Justice Fitzpatrick said.

After weighing the public interest in having the murder allegation tested at trial against Sweeting’s constitutional right to a hearing within a reasonable time, he found that no lesser remedy would be appropriate.

The ruling does not amount to a finding that Sweeting is innocent.

Justice Fitzpatrick rejected a separate argument that there had not been reasonable suspicion to support the murder charge when it was brought in 2017.

He found that prosecutors had sufficient material at the outset, including Dean’s eyewitness statement, to establish reasonable suspicion. Whether the prosecution ultimately had enough evidence to prove the murder would ordinarily have been determined at trial after the evidence was tested.

That trial will now not take place.