NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Former Cabinet minister Shane Gibson yesterday issued an ultimatum for police to rescind the promotion of the lead investigator in his bribery trial.
Gibson noted Debra Thompson had been promoted from Assistant Superintendent of Police to Superintendent of Police despite his outstanding complaint seeking disciplinary proceedings for her conduct during his prosecution.
He said he planned to file an application for judicial review of the promotion in the Supreme Court, and seek to have it quashed, if it was not rescinded within 14 days.
Gibson was acquitted last November, and has filed a lawsuit against the Attorney General, the Commissioner of Police, the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Thompson and contractor Jonathan Ash, a key prosecution witness in his trial before Justice Carolita Bethel.
“The decision to promote Ms. Thompson was made despite my pending complaint against her and the fact that I was not afforded an opportunity to be heard in regard to the same,” Gibson wrote in a letter to the Police Service Commission dated May 1.
“The decision to promote her was made, even though she received condemnation by Justice Indra Charles in a ruling dated 8th March 2019, (in my constitutional application to quash the indictment against me) where Justice Charles said, ‘Unkind as it may be, ASP Thompson struck me as an officer with very little investigative skills despite her impressive rank in the RBPF. I say this because prosecution witnesses should not be brought together to discuss their evidence, exchange their account and decide as to what to say and what they should omit to say in their statements and evidence’.”
The letter continued: “Further in my trial, where I was acquitted of all the charges against me, Debra Thompson under cross-examination admitted to numerous incidents of impropriety in the conduct of the investigation against me.
It added: “What makes the decision to promote Debra Thompson more egregious is that she admitted that it is common practice for two witnesses to be brought together to synchronize their stories and accounts of matters in dispute. This leads one to believe that my case is not the first time she has been involved in this unethical and unlawful practice.”
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