Cop acquitted of raping 15-year-old female prisoner

A police officer on Wednesday was acquitted by a nine-member jury of a charge of raping a 15-year-old prisoner being kept at the Questelles police station.

Keith Thompson, who had been a member of the Royal St Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force (RSVGPF) for 10 years at the time of the alleged offence, was found not guilty of the crime, after a female-majority jury retired for three hours.

The verdict was returned on a majority of 7-2, and Thompson, 36 years, walked out of court to hug a woman who was waiting outside. The second person he embraced was his defence attorney Kay Bacchus-Baptiste.

The case for the prosecution, presented by crown counsel Karim Nelson, was that the police officer, on July 10, 2011, committed the act at the Questelles Police Station.

The complainant was being kept on remand until her next court date on a charge of handling stolen goods.

A number of male officers who worked at the Questelles police station gave evidence, and one of the officers said that he saw Thompson and another officer go to buy beer, and when they returned they headed to the recreational room. To get to the recreational room, they passed the cells. The officer said that when he checked on the prisoner later she was drinking something, but he could not say what it was.

The complainant in her evidence said that the accused had given her beer, and she drank it all. After this, she had to go to the bathroom, but she couldn’t use the one inside her cell, which wasn’t working.

She said she went to the bathroom accompanied by the accused, who waited outside the stall. After she finished, before she could pull up her pants and underwear, she said the police officer came into the bathroom stall, bent her over and raped her. She said she was dizzy from the beer.

She had written a letter to the police saying that she did not want to continue with the case, due to the costs of travelling back and forth between the mainland and the Grenadine Island where she lives.

Under cross examination, she also said that she had drunk a rum and coke at the station before. She agreed that she had touched the officer’s penis before, when he was saying “all kinds of rudeness” to her.

Two other male officers testified that she had mentioned to them that she had sexual intercourse with Thompson. In one instance, the officer said that she said that Thompson was her man and that he would “brush” her. The officer understood her to mean the two were having sex, but he said she was joking.

The police investigator said in court that she did not feel as though she got the full co-operation of those working at the station, and described them as hesitant.

The defendant had testified that the complainant had once escaped from the station twice in the same day and they went out to recapture her. The first time he said he found her in the bushes, and the second time she was taken from a minivan. He said he slapped her twice, and threatened to shoot her in the foot if she escaped again.

On the day in question he said that he did not engage in any alcohol drinking, and that he wasn’t feeling well. He said because he wasn’t feeling well, another police officer stayed with him at the office all day. Therefore, by his version, he was not alone as the complainant had said. He said that at no time did she ask to use the bathroom, and that she was not allowed to use the bathroom outside of the cell since she escaped previously. He said that the bathroom in the cell worked well. There was no sexual intercourse between the two at all, he said.

Thompson had been on suspension from the RSVGPF since he was charged in 2011.