Old Harbour gangster to serve seven years in prison

Smith, 24, was yesterday sentenced by Justice Bertram Morrison in the St Catherine Circuit Court, Spanish Town, after pleading guilty last year.

He has been sentenced to:

• Two years and six months – for being a part of a criminal organization
• Seven years and five months – for aiding and abetting the carrying out of serious offences by a criminal organization
• Six years and five months – for being an accessory before the fact to the carrying out of serious offences by a criminal organization

The sentences will run concurrently which means the convicted gangster will serve a maximum of 89 months in prison.

Smith of a Panton Lane address and better known by the alias ‘Grazmite’, had pleaded guilty to the charges on December 13, 2022.

His sentencing hearing was however rescheduled couple times before now.

His sentencing brings to an end five years of meticulous work by investigators assigned to the St Catherine South Police Division.

According to details made public in court a gang feud erupted after Smith was linked to the August 9, 2017 homicide of Kemar Fogah who was shot dead in a gun attack by three armed thugs in the community of Panton Lane.

In a bid to exact revenge for the killing of Fogah, men aligned to the deceased, murdered Smith’s older brother Paul ‘Pablo’ Wallis in Marlie Acres, Old Harbour on August 20, 2017.

Smith, the court was told, is a member of the Sparta Gang based in Smith Avenue. The gang operated a syndicated criminal enterprise involving robberies, extortion and killings, the prosecution stated.

Then only 19 years old at the time, Smith was taken by his cronies to a hideout in Harmons district in Porus, Manchester. However, on August 27, 2017, Smith was shot and injured in a gun attack. He was taken to the Mandeville Hospital where he was treated and released into police custody.

It was further revealed in the court that Smith gave a caution statement to the police on August 28, 2017, the day after he was shot in Harmons, admitting to being a member of the Sparta Gang headquartered in Smith Avenue and that he had knowledge of the gang committing murders and robberies within the Old Harbour area.

Detectives say that the Sparta Gang has severely disintegrated after several members were killed in an intra-gang feud that’s presently active.

Smith was represented by Kings Council Peter Champagnie.

Under the Criminal Justice (Suppression of Criminal Organisations) (Amendment) Act, 2021, or Anti-Gang legislation the state is further empowered to prosecute groups engaged in criminal activities.

During an anti-gang forum organized by the Ministry of Education last year, Senior Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions in the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (ODPP), Jeremy

Taylor explained the effectiveness of the new legislation.

“What has changed with the new legislation is that we no longer have to look at individuals, because up to 2014 we really could only prosecute the individual, irrespective of what other persons may have done either in the background or foreground. You could only move against the individual in that respect. Now, this new Act allows us to move against groups and you have seen that we have brought certain groups to trial.

“Even if you are not the trigger person, you are the person who drives them to do the crime, you are charged as a facilitator of the criminal offence, just as how if you are the person who shoots the person, you are also charged as the facilitator of the criminal offence.

“It speaks about providing a benefit to a criminal organisation. These are the gun bags; if you carry the guns for the criminal organisation to hide or to ‘lock’, you have provided a benefit. If you carry the stolen goods, you carry them to a pawn shop and you sell them, you have provided a benefit. If you get a doctor for a person, knowing he is a member of a gang and has committed a gang-related activity, you have provided a benefit… The law has tried to cover all the major areas,” said Taylor as quoted by state media JIS.

More than 80 percent of murders committed in Jamaica are gang-related, according to the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF).