Jean Rony Jean-Charles
By AVA TURNQUEST
Tribune Chief Reporter
aturnquest@tribunemedia.net
BAHAMAS-born Jean Rony Jean-Charles pledged yesterday to fight for his right to remain in the country as he pushed back against speculation over his ability to prove his identity.
The 35-year-old at the centre of a legal battle that has far-reaching implications for the country’s immigration and citizenship laws, told The Tribune he lives in constant fear of being sent back to Haiti.
“I’m tired of everything,” he said. “I just want to get it over with so I can know what to do, to stop stressing out, to stop thinking.
“I dream about it all the time, all the time, it come back again when I went to (the Court of Appeal), so now I start dreaming about it.
“I don’t like those type dreams (of Haiti). Just having to stay in one spot with nothing to do, the heat, I really don’t want to go back, the smoke.
“I done ain’ know nobody like that,” he added. “It feel like I’m some lil’ dog, like lil’ children have to stay in one spot. To just get water you have to go way over there, to have to climb that mountain again.”
Mr Jean-Charles was picked up during a routine immigration patrol in the Fire Trail Road area on September 18, 2017, and deported to Haiti some two months later on November 24, 2017.
Last week, the Court of Appeal set aside the Supreme Court ruling that ordered his return to the country, and mandated constitutional relief from the government.
In their written ruling, Sir Michael Barnett, with fellow Court of Appeal justices Jon Isaacs, and Hartman Longley, stated there could be no finding of a constitutional breach as it related to Mr Jean-Charles’ detention and deportation, due to lack of certainty over his identity.
“I feel bad about that,” Mr Jean-Charles said, “it makes me feel like they don’t believe me, like I didn’t born here, but I did. It’s my fault still, I was supposed to apply for my papers. But I got plenty people who know me from small growing up, being in school, I got proof I can prove. I’ll fight to stay here.
“I could see if I was born over there (in Haiti),” Mr Jean-Charles continued, “it would have been different. I wouldn’t even worry about this right now. But I ain’ even born there to be going through all this trouble now. It ain’ like they can’t go in the system and pull up my files. I’m sure they can find them, they can go to the hospital and all.
“They know who I is,” he said.
“They just playing stuck up, they know just who I is. I gone to prison before and I got released. They have plenty things they can check, they just playing a game.”
During the Supreme Court trial, the Department of Immigration stated that an adult Haitian national who gave his name as “Jean Charles” and stated his date of birth as December 1, 1985, was arrested and detained by immigration officers during a routine status check on Fire Trail Road.
The man also reportedly confirmed his identity as “Jean Charles,” date of birth December 1, 1985 during a roll call of passengers before boarding the plane.
The department added there was no record or conclusive evidence, based on information provided at the time, that Jean Charles and Jean Rony Jean-Charles are the same person.
During a previous interview with The Tribune in Haiti, Mr Jean-Charles insisted he told officials repeatedly during his detention that his birth date is December 5, 1982.
Yesterday, he admitted he provided an incorrect date when he was first processed.
“That day I guess I was nervous, that wasn’t my real date of birth,” Mr Jean-Charles said yesterday.
“I was nervous, when I looked at it I realised it was wrong but I couldn’t scotch it (cross it out). After I gave them that the first time, they put me in the dorm, and so much people been around to me after that.
“I give them the right date and I wrote the name too after that. I always telling them the right date of birth, I don’t know if they ever checked. Every time they came, I gave them the right date. Even when the Haitian consulate been over there - I told them.”
Back in February, the Haitian Embassy in Nassau told The Tribune it had no record of Mr Jean-Charles deportation.
The embassy confirmed, at the time, it delegates two consular agents to notify individuals at the Carmichael Road Detention Centre of their impending deportation.
Mr Jean-Charles said: “I was telling them check my name, check please I’m sure you will see my name in the system. They (immigration) don’t care though, they shipping ya. They don’t care in the back there.
“If they had listened to me this wouldn’t have happened,” he said.
“Before they arrest me, I told them I’m a Bahamian, I’m going to work. I told them before you handcuff me let me walk on the bus then. I gone. (Men) around there who know me was like, ‘oh you gone catch a ride eh?’ That day I was sick, and my birthday was coming too, I had to do my birthday in Haiti.
“This got me still thinking, I don’t want to be walking on the street and they pick me up start asking me all types of questions carry me again. Some people tell me they see on the news where they say if they see me on the road anywhere they gonna catch me. I don’t know. “Fred Smith (his attorney) call me and tell me don’t worry about that. It’s like I’m a target. It have me parry (paranoid), it have me thinking.”
Attorney General Carl Bethel has previously said the case of Mr Jean-Charles placed the government in a position uncovered by law or the Constitution, and also exposes a significant and far-reaching legal challenge over the verification of birth certificates.
Mr Bethel told The Tribune last week Mr Jean-Charles would be “accorded a fair opportunity to prove that he is the person who is in the birth certificate” submitted in court documents.
In an interview with The Tribune earlier this month, Immigration Minister Brent Symonette explained the department relied on numerous elements to verify the identity of people seeking citizenship. He spoke generally to The Tribune on the current overhaul of immigration laws currently underway, and the challenges presented by widespread fraud.
“A lot of times you have to verify yourself in another way,” Mr Symonette said.
“First of all in the case of (older) persons (using an affidavit) that was the only way to do it. Now we can test, you traveled, certificate of identity, you’ve been to schools, you’ve been christened, or baptized. So there are a lot more ways of checking who you are now.”
For his part, Mr Jean-Charles believes he will be able to successfully prove his claim to his own birth certificate.
He reportedly went to Albury Sayles Primary, T G Glover Primary, S C McPherson Junior High, and C V Bethel Senior School. He did not graduate from C V Bethel, he said.
At 16, Mr Jean-Charles said he was arrested for possession of a marijuana joint. He was fined and sentenced to one month in prison. He was also reportedly in hospital several years ago for blood poisoning, which left him with recurring episodes of numbness in his legs.
“I is Jean Rony, it’s me,” he said. “I is a good person, I don’t be in trouble. I stay out of trouble, stay out of people way. I’m a hard worker I get the job done, I’m no lazy person. No I didn’t graduate (high school). I thought about it now. I would, if they let me.
“I can’t answer right now,” he said when asked what he wanted to do with his life, and whether winning his case will give him a new chance at life.
“I’m definitely thinking about it, like starting a family, to slow down,” Mr Jean-Charles said.
“It’s a chance, it’s a 50/50 chance but I can’t answer right now.”
Comments
bogart 6 years ago
He needs to be telling them ...he enrolling in Primary schools again......for free schooling .....for all migrants .....where they cannot ask any questions of his citizenship ...or any questions of his parents nationality.....disregarding obvious ...national secutity concerns who is in da country borders......you cannot leads dis man up a path for schooling at taxpayers expemse paying all this money........teaching him....'bout great Bahamian heroes....to.speaks da Queens english....erryting geared to continue living in da Bahamas.....not scrap of Creole language or Haiti heroes.....dem wants to sends him back....regardless whether he applies or not in space of 12 months..after whole 18 years of accepting him widdout asking him for his legal status or parents status to be in the classrooms...educated wid pore Bahamian taxpayers money....18 years !!!!.........then..drops him like a hot potato
licks2 6 years ago
You are one of the loud mouth persons talking nonsense when he and his lawyer were all over the place "using up his good will" all up in the people's faces. . .I told yall that his lawyer, RB, himself and people like you were talking foolishness and he was the one who have to pay for their crap!! Now the rule of law gat he tail" he and you want to come back and ask them same people yall dissed all over the place for a "lil break". . .they will give you none. . .that's how the Bahamian are. . .ask our politicians. . .when you talk bad all up in their faces. . .they will "hold it in for you". All this talk about where his information can be found and he and his backers een gone looking like crazy as yet? This nation will not help him for joining with his backers and dissing them internationally!!
John 6 years ago
Mr. Jean-Charles and his attorney gave the Government of The Bahamas a black eye. In fact, they went even further than that and, if only for a moment, held the country by its most delicate parts, vis-a-vis, the apparent flaws in its immigration laws or the improper procedures carried out by the immigration department, And it was revealed that the Bahamas may not be the only victim to the Haitian immigration problem, but some accused of being illegal, but were born and raised in the Bahamas, probably dozens of them, may be sitting and suffering in the back hills of Haiti, a foreign place and a strange country they never knew. So is it now the time for both The Bahamas and Jean-Charles to bury the hatchet? to lay down the tools of battle and come to some middle ground. Can Charles be given, if only the documents of residency in this country, with the rights to file for citizenship at a later time, and this episode be used as a teaching moment for everyone? Or will Charles be grabbed up at the most early opportunity and shipped back off to a country he claims he never knew?
licks2 6 years ago
Wrong approach. . .you don't fight and black-up the people's eyes internationally. . .lose the battle. . .THEN ASK THE WINNER TO "LETS BURY THE HATCHET"!! He took his bitty self. . .and let those fools "run him up on breaks"". . .now his case is mandated by the court. . .the government just can't "give him a break". . .citizens can now demand that the government stay with the court ruling in this case. . .the court has ruled!! He can only go to the PC or he get swing!! THAT'S THE RULE HIS FRIENDS AND LAWYERS PLAYED WITH THE PEOPLE OF THE BAHAMAS!! THEY MUST FOLLOW THROUGH OR THEIR HARD HEADEDNESS WILL AFFECT MANY MORE PERSONS IN THE SITUATION LIKE MR. JEAN!!
The_Oracle 6 years ago
Our successive administrations have been taught many lessons, but they do not learn, preferring the heavy hand of personal power, ignoring Authority under rule of law. Un-Constitutional action is their preferred course of action or, inaction. A society unwilling to challenge the often false assertions of the Elected and appointed will suffer the consequences of their silent consent. When a Man's future hangs in the balance, the travesties of self determination are all the more apparent.
licks2 6 years ago
THE COURT HAS RULED MR. . ."WHAT THE HELL YOU GERN ON WITH? STAY OUT OF SERIOUS DIALOGUE IF YOU WILL CONTINUE TO TALK NONSENSE. . .TALKING ABOUT THE RULE OF LAW AND THEN ADVOCATE RULE BY MOB. . .TAKE YA CASE TO THE PC. . .OR JUST STAY QUITE COS YOON MAKING NO SENSE!!
John 6 years ago
And the thing about this eye-opening episode is that many young Bahamian men or their family members also claim they (the young men, and now even young women), have been arrested, had false charges put on them by police officers and sent to prison (on remand) and their cases are never called for many years. And so they sit in prison for many years because their families do not have the means to get legal assistance. And they grow angrier by the minute, sitting in prison and lost in a prison system for crimes they apparently did not commit. And when they are finally released, they come out with an ankle bracelet or labelled as 'being known to police, which continues to make their lives more unbearable. Whatever happened with the case of the young jet-ski operator who was accused of rape several years ago and sent to jail on remand?
licks2 6 years ago
WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? Do you really think that after the government had to pay for two recent cases of "people rotting in jail" we/they will allow such injustice to carry on? Now if any up there where they family don't have money. . .you blame the system for that? Think some times before you write. . .
John 6 years ago
You need to think before you respond..and especially when you respond ignorantly so.. If an innocent person is in jail, rotting even, and his family doesn't have the means to defend him or get him out, then whose fault is it? The laws of natural justice (and of the Bahamas) say innocent until proven guilty. And everyone is entitled to justice...It is a wicked law that preys on young innocent victims and sends them to jail, and you are wicked for upholding.it. but we understand. . . "You must not exploit or oppress a foreign resident, for you yourselves were foreigners in the land of Egypt. 22You must not mistreat any widow or orphan. 23If you do mistreat them, and they cry out to Me in distress, I will surely hear their cry.…" says the Lord God Almighty.
licks2 6 years ago
Brig the rest of that same Bible verse. . .IT SAYS IF THE STRANGER IN YOUR GATES REFUSE TO OBEY YOUR LAW LET THEM BE PUT TO DEATH JUST AS YOU ARE. . .
FURTHER, THE STRANGER CAN BE TREATED AS ONE OF YOU. . .HE MUST FOLLOW ALL YOUR LAWS. . .IF HE REFUSE PUT HIM TO DEATH. . .
It is not the norm to put innocent people in jails. . .that's why the whole world have preliminary arrangements. . .stop gap to prevent innocents going to jails! THERE IS A LIMIT TO NATURAL JUSTICE. . .THE WHOLE WORLD PUT PERSONS IN PRISONS BEFORE TRAILS ARE FINISH BASED ON ARRANGEMENTS. . .TRIAGE SHOW PREPONDERANCE OF GUILT. . .EVEN BEFORE TRAILS. . .
licks2 6 years ago
Mr. Jean played a dangerous game of "spitting in the faces of the Bahamian people". . .the Bahamian people demanded our government to "deal with this nonsense" and the only avenue left open to us by Mr. Jean, his lawyer and Right Bahamas was "the law is the law. . . any shame yinna suffer just suck it up"!!! The table turned on them as me and others warned. . .so now they want to "suck up to the people". . .its too late for that. . .the court has ruled!!! IT'S OVER FOR MR. JEAN. . .HE PROVES WHO HE IS OR HE IS GONE. . .AND IF THEY GO TO THE PC. . .PLENTY MORE LIKE HIM GONE TOO!!
geostorm 6 years ago
@licks2, well said!! Now WE the PEOPLE rest our case. Let him go to the Privy Council. I am sick and tired of people taking advantage of us!
Porcupine 6 years ago
You mean being taken advantage of by the people you elect?
jackbnimble 6 years ago
This is what happens when you allow illegals them to enter the country unchecked and then attend school without papers. All that free education and yet he can hardly speak English and not a soul can say they went to school with him. I'm surprised he's not still pushing that story about his papers being lost in a fire. I guess that didn't wash with the courts.
Too many illegals are running around with forged documents and I suspect he's one of them.
Hope they challenge this case all the way to the Privy Council and then deport him. This will shut that Smith man up and send a message to the rest.
bogart 6 years ago
Re: Jackbnimble....you quite intelligently see the challenge in the govt following their policy......or as some politicians say ...follow the "rules" ...policy...in dis case the ....free education.....without any being denied....and no questions asked of their parents nationality....Any ...Bahamian should....be outraged at the breach of National Security and Immigration laws from inception..and this goes on at great rxpense of taxpayers....many stoires of bona fide Bahamian children being outnumbered in classrooms...and then the part with the Citizdnship Notices in papers for years requesting of the public....and only recently they has photo id to see...even though many people share close ...similar names....not all is perfect..laws on Gender Equality...Quieting....some "rules".....and noone should be censured threatened...victimized..intimidated...in getting to the truth...solution that brings greater stability to da nation....
bogart 6 years ago
Re: Jackbnimble...on the many names and challenges identification details..critical from the school...just .... google criminal suspect rony jean
John 6 years ago
Well pindling deported several white gangsters and so did Hubert Ingraham. But if this man can prove he was born in the Bahamas and lived here all his natural life, he cannot be deported. he may no longer be entitled to citizenship, but he cannot legally be deported from the Bahamas...and Haiti should not accept him as such.
licks2 6 years ago
I keep telling you to think before you talk/write. . .HE CAN ONLY STAY HERE THROUGH THE GOOD WILL OF THE BAHAMIAN PEOPLE/GOVERNMENT!! Birth is no constitutional right to abode!!! This time it seem like Mr. Jean has more sense and "manners" than yinna loud mouthed advocates who "running him up on breaks". . .where only him one will have to get deported back to Haiti!! Any non-citizen can be deported any time he/she violate any rules that prevents them from staying here legally! What you should say is that if he can prove who he is then we can start to "deal with him". . .it een where he born. . .the court question in ruling is " who is Jean Charles Rony" who was born dec. 1, 1985. Is he the same Jean Rony born 12 dec. 1982? That's the question there fella. . .not where he was born!
TheMadHatter 6 years ago
"“I don’t like those type dreams (of Haiti). Just having to stay in one spot with nothing to do, the heat, I really don’t want to go back, the smoke."
Yet people in Haiti continue to have children by the zillions to live there, heat up, and breath smoke.
Why do Haitians hate their children so much? It's hard to have compassion for peoppe who hate children and abuse them.
licks2 6 years ago
How can we deduce "Haitians hate their children" from the news paper is beyond me. . .I think the same thing about some Bahamians, Americans etc. Haitians are no better or worst people than we are. . . my great-great grand mother was Haitian.
bogart 6 years ago
Re: Licks....what a bunch of drivil from you such hogwash even fer all yer SPINNING.....you claiming the man an his lawyer all over da place ......"using up all he good will"........WRONG...BULLA,,,!!!......What GOODWILL... goodwilll.....??....da Bahamian law is clear...YOU IS A BAHAMIAN ...OR ....YOUSE ISNT.....even you knows aint no two ways bout dat.....Goodwill....da gubbermint picks this man ups .....puts him....indere gubbermint facility......AND HE DISAPPEARS.....without going to court...JEAN SISTER DEM DID NOT KNOWS WHERE HE IS....almost three weeks.....,!!!.......da gubbermint peoples dem ....DA MANS FEMALE RELATIVES BEEN LOOKING FOR WHERE HE IS......EVEN DA EMBASSY PEOPLE CLAIMS DEY DID NOT KNOW WHERE HE IS ....COURT HAD TO ISSUE ORDER TO FINDS HIM....LUCKILY HIS LAWYER AN DA NEWSPAPERS HAD TO GO FINDS HIM.....thank goodness he lawyer an Newspapers...finds him an COURT SAY TO PRODUCE THIS ....DIS......MAN WHO GETS LOCKS UP AN DISAPPEARS..WITHOUT HE DAY IN COURT...,!!!...his lawyer only following da laws.....that is his rights...much as some dont like it......hear any other fellow lawyer say anyting.complaining..like 1,000 plus others....???....Goodwill.. .???...bey.looks like you been advising the other Gubbermint an Embassy people how to spin.....
licks2 6 years ago
All this information you throw at me the court had all that!!! The court even een use the other part of the information that it will "jook yinna case up" with. . .YINNA CAN'T PROVE WHO THE HELL IS JEAN RONY!!! The court stopped yinna case right there and tell yall: "yinna gatta prove who this man is first"! What yinna think Mr. Smith was rowing about after the ruling. . ."they even een listen to my main question constitutional question". They want to know who is Jean Rony first! You talk about habeus corpus. . .which means "show the body"!! What body? The body that belongs to Jean Charles Rony born dec. 1, 1985. . .or is it Jean Rony born 12 dec. 1982. . .one body born three years after the first one!! Which body yinna ger present to the court? That's hebeus corpus for ya. . .ya can only present one body for the court!!
licks2 6 years ago
I feel for Mr. Jean Charles. . .he will not fare well in this case. . .I hope for his sake that the government give him a break and allow him to stay without "yukking up" the ire of the Bahamians people. . .the people who his dumb advocates gambled with his well being against. . . now he will have to pay for their pig pigheadedness. . . THIS IS NOT RIGHT IF HIS CASE IS AS HE SAYS. . .he will have a deep hole to dig himself from. . .he needs to get rid of Mr. Smith and RB and take his chances with the people of the Bahamas. . .ONLY THEY CAN SAY WHO ENTERS AND STAY IN THEIR COUNTRY. . .OR WHO BECOME CITIZEN!!
John 6 years ago
Obviously licks is ignorant to the facts to which he trying to speak so loudly about. Firstly Mr. Jean was not deported because he has no legal status in this country but because he had no documents to prove he was who said he was. The immigration department wasn’t buying his story about his documents being lost in a fire and they quickly shipped him out before his sister could get some documents for him. Secondly the court of appeals did not rule that Jean-Charles had no legal rights to be in this country. Their ruling was that since Jean- Charles could prove who he said he was at the time he was deported, Immigration had every right to deport him from the country without repercussions. But then this begs the legal question as to how they knew he was from Haiti and what travel documents did they use to deport him to Haiti. You cannot confuse Jean-Charles, the victim, with Fred Smith, the attorney. Jean.Charles says this is an unfortunate incident he got himself in. It is like a bad dream, a horrible nightmare he just wants to go away. He is tired of all the legal wrangling and the uncertainty of his status in this country. Fred Smith is more ambitious. Apparently he wants to continue the fight with the government and with Immigration and is looking for the opportunity to land some heavy blows and collect mega bucks. Charles must now find a way to divorce himself from this lawyer/client marriage.
licks2 6 years ago
YOU DON'T HAVE A GOOD GRASP OF THIS CASE AS I TOLD YOU SIR. . .YOU CALLED ME IGNORANT. . .BUT YOUR FELLOW POSTERS CAN SEE WHO DON'T HAVE A GRASP OF THE INFORMATION.
SP 6 years ago
Bahamians are on record ignorantly trying to help and being neighborly to Haitians for decades and these ungrateful, parasitic, people spat in our faces at every given opportunity.
Send this dam Haitian and all like him back to their beloved Haiti where they can proudly speak Creole, fly their Haitian flags, and enjoy Haitian flag day with their people!
Haitians and people of Haitian descent have over and repeatedly proved beyond any doubt their allegiance remains with Haiti.
We don't want them here!
bogart 6 years ago
SP.....yes many Bahamians are lashing out....many unfairly at the Haishuns in da Bahamas .......they come here because of desperation...not knowing a scrap of english....seeking a better life....Mamy are hired by ....obviously persons wid money to employs dem......whichin if you sees where dis going......meaning leaves out the many pore struggling Bahamians...They are facilitated...hired..by echelons and friends...encouragements...lack of manpower to eradicate run down shantytowns for years...no employer ever fined...strains on setvices...taxpayers includong you and family paying for....blame must be at the incompetant...lackdasical...policies...govt personnel that ...emcourages...facilates....this....Haishuns are humans taking advamtages and use of erryting some Bahamians provide....cant blame dem....
John 6 years ago
Wonder if they realize how easy it is to realize when the same person is writing under two, three, even four different pen names. But it’s ok. Desperate times makes for desperate people. When you throw rock in the bush the ones who holler is the ones who get hit, except when... see!
jamaicaproud 6 years ago
Man apply for asylum in Jamaica or something. They don't want you in dey country. Free yourself.
OldFort2012 6 years ago
This is very hard to understand for a Bahamian, almost impossible for anyone looking in from outside.
You delegate one or two police officer to check in detail the records of his claims: the schools, the hospital, the friends and relatives. You produce a dossier and you present it to the Minister of Immigration. If he is who he says he is, you regularize his position. Immediately. If there is not enough evidence, you deport him. Immediately.
It cannot possibly take longer than a week. Either way, what they are doing to this guy is not how you or I would want to be treated. You cannot leave someone in limbo for years and destroy their life just because you cannot be bothered to do a thorough job.
licks2 6 years ago
I DO AGREE TOO. . .
bogart 6 years ago
Re: OldFort2012....Bingo..!!...These issues must be sorted out at the beginning. It is time an Amnesty period be offerred for persons meeting certain criteria, and after that regulated amounts of legal migrants be allowed humanitarian, economic, to meet needs of nation etc. Nation cannot continue to be torn apart over increasing instances of descreptancies made years ago which claims can be made of the govt inefficiencies ..slothfullness.. gender rights accepted internationally ...and when there are statutes of limitations barring further action in certain areas exist.
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