Guilty verdicts in drug conspiracy trial

| 10/11/2017 | 13 Comments

(CNS): The three men on trial for conspiring to supply controlled drugs were found guilty on most of the charges against them. After a total of five hours deliberation since retiring the day before, the jury delivered verdicts Thursday on Ian Duncan, Wayne Myles and Ukel Dixon on nine counts of conspiracy to supply cocaine and ganja. Duncan, who testified during the trial, was found guilty on four of the six counts against him. Myles was found guilty on one of two counts, and Dixon guilty on the sole count against him; both of those men declined to give evidence.

Much of the evidence in the trial, which opened 23 October, took the form of extensive records of both texts and calls that were extracted from the cell phone of Alex Ebanks, who was jailed in 2016 for six and a half years after pleading guilty to drug-related offences. Each of the three men on trial was accused of conspiring with Ebanks to sell drugs based on WhatsApp messages and calls between them and Ebanks, as well as messages between the convicted drug dealer and his customers. During the trial Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Patrick Moran pointed to evidence of more than 400 chats involving 50 different customers.

In his summing up Wednesday, Justice Quin said the counts against Duncan were based on specific dates between August and September 2015 in which the crown contended Duncan was conspiring with Ebanks.

Myles’ offences took place on two days in August and September 2015, and Dixon was accused of conspiring with Ebanks to supply drugs sometime between 19 September 2015 and 22 October 2015.

Ebanks was arrested 22 October 2015 outside an apartment in Lakeside Villas, where the police seized two cell phones as well as assorted drug paraphernalia and drugs.

The extraction of “a vast amount of data” by crown witness, police intelligence analyst Joanne Delaney, led to copious pages of transcripts of phone messages between Ebanks and his customers as well as messages and calls to the men accused of conspiring with him.

Justice Quin recounted that the crown said the messages showed Duncan was a frequent customer of Ebanks and was buying drugs for onward sale. Defence counsel Christer Brady maintained that all the purchases, which often involved 3.5 grams or seven grams of cocaine at a time, were for Duncan’s personal use; during testimony the defendant detailed his heavy drug use and addiction issues.

The judge also noted that the prosecution said Myles, like Duncan, preferred to buy drugs in large quantities for onward supply. Defence counsel Alex Davies maintained that there was no evidence that his client was intending to supply drugs to others, that no messages referred to any agreement between Ebanks and Myles.

Ebanks had stored the phone number connected to Myles under the name “Beenie” and Myles denied that was him. However, a police officer who knew Myles testified he also used that nickname, but defence counsel argued the officer’s evidence was unreliable.

The case against Dixon was different, said Justice Quin, in that he was accused of acting as a runner for Ebanks, delivering drugs to customers and collecting cash. Telephone records showed contact between Ebanks and customers and then Ebanks contacting the phone identified as Dixon’s. But there was no evidence that Dixon was present when those messages were sent or received. There was also evidence presented during the trial of Ebanks telling various customers to call Dixon, using his name or his telephone number, about deliveries. But Dixon’s lawyer did not get the opportunity to question the people who sent the messages.

As part of his direction to the jury, Justice Quin said Myles and Dixon had the absolute right not to give evidence and that it was up to the prosecution to prove its case, but that meant there was no rebuttal of the crown’s evidence. Any adverse inference the jurors might make from the men not testifying could not support the case on its own; the crown must satisfy the burden of proof, the justice said.

After the verdicts were read, Justice Quin ordered social inquiry reports on the three men and set sentencing for 2 February 2018, with bail continued until then.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Tags:

Category: Courts, Crime

Comments (13)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Anonymous says:

    Shoulda plead guilty you woulda been out by next year lol

  2. Anonymous says:

    Under the jail for them and throw the key in the sea Quinn! These stupid humans deserve to rot for all the pain they have caused to families and individuals. And track down those “end users” that think they have no blood on their hands!

    4
    1
  3. Anonymous says:

    The war on drugs has been and will forever be a losing battle.

    4
    2
  4. Sleepless in South Sound says:

    Just a general query here, but during this trial, evidence was presented from suspected ‘buyers’ of narcotics with messages such as “Hey, can i get a gram”? being put in open court. Will the RCIPS further investigate the end users of the narcotics? If there is no demand for illicit substances, or at least incarcerated (local) / deported (expatriate) customers, this furthers the ambition of removing the illicit narcotic business from Cayman. Just my 2cents…

    10
    • Anonymous says:

      We all know majority of the customers/consumers are foreigners living here. They will not investigate it further as deporting Lawyers/Accountants would make CIG lose significant revenue from work permit fees. They are after the Caymanians alone.

      11
      8
      • Anonymous says:

        You have proof of that? Or maybe the proof is in your own whatsapp messages. And who is “we” ? Love how it came down to work permits again. Trying to avoid the fact that the 3 guilty are your own home grown thugs. No biggie. “We” are not bothered by the sound of your broken record.

        6
        1
        • Anonymous says:

          So i guess what you are saying is the service industry is full of Caymanians? The initial comment was based on the end users, the dealer and conspirators have already been caught in this case. Just because you do not use, it does not mean your expat boss or co-workers do not either. The bottom line is, any Caymanian or expat in the service industry knows exactly who the end users are and majority of them are work permit holders. Just go to some of the events where the majority of attendees are expat work permit holders, then take a trip to the bathroom and just pay attention to your surroundings.God forbid Immigration starts drug screening work permit holders. “We” will stand by and watch your perfect little world crumble.

          4
          1
    • Lo-Cal says:

      No – There would be no lawyers or accountants left!

      6
      1
    • Anonymous says:

      Burn phones. No-one uses their main personal phone to order supplies in.

  5. Miss Prim says:

    Sock it to ’em! Sock it to ’em! Sock it to ’em!

    7
    3

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.