Court Overturns Armed Robbery Conviction

NASSAU, BAHAMAS – A man who spent 12 years in prison for armed robbery has been exonerated after the Privy Council ruled that he was convicted on inadmissible evidence.

Vinson Ariste was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment in 2012 after a jury convicted him of the July 16, 2010 hold up of Andrea Donaldson based on a confession that was not corroborated by any other evidence.

The Privy Council today said that “a young man has been languishing in prison for over 12 years on the basis of a confession that shouldn’t have been admitted in evidence against him.”

Police arrested Ariste at his home on July 21, 2010. Between July 22 and 25, Ariste confessed to the robbery of Donaldson as well as six other offenses, including murder.

When Ariste was taken into police custody, his detention record said that he was in good health.

When he was remanded to prison on July 27, 2010, the prison doctor recorded that Ariste had a number of injuries including a temporal abrasion, multiple handcuff abrasions, a skin avulsion on the left wrist, bruising of the buttocks, and a 6cm abrasion or ulcer on his right buttock.

Ariste did not have a lawyer when he was detained by the police. He also was unrepresented by a lawyer at his trial.

The trial judge rejected his application to have the confession excluded on the basis that it was not given voluntarily.

The Court of Appeal upheld the judge’s decision and dismissed Ariste’s appeal.

However, the country’s final appeal court found that both the Supreme Court judge and Court of Appeal were wrong.