Craig L. Stoddard’s conviction quashed – Att. Anthony L. Johnson
At the time of being implicated in the crime Stoddard was in the budding stages of his young adult life at 20 years old and worked with an insurance firm. He was one young man who was credited to have been of a very good character but all that was whipped away and his name, character and image were records of “bad eggs of society”. He is now 27 years old.
Though he has been out of prison for some time now life as he once knew it was no more and today he still struggles to keep his head high and gain the respect he once had. This had caused him to continue to press for justice to prove his innocence.
Following the sentencing Mr Stoddard’s Attorney Mr Anthony L. Johnson had filed an appeal as he had found that his client was wrongful implicated in the matter and subsequently sentenced. Stoddard and others were accused of conspiring with “persons unknown” in the Aug. 15, 2007 robbery.
Last evening having learnt of the development, this news site contacted the attorney who in retrospect recalled the incident that led to Mr Stoddard being implicated, arrested, charged and incarcerated, tried and found guilty by a panel of judges and subsequently sentenced to five years in prison all in relation to the armed robbery of the National Bank of the Virgin Islands.
“Here is a young man who had a good reputation before the incident and was not at the scene of the incident but yet was convicted,” said his attorney.
Two persons were shot in that robbery one being the Honourable Andrew A. Fahie (R1) who was Minister for Education and Culture at that time. The perpetrators escaped with $56k also. Three persons were held and charged for the crimes however while the case against one of the men was dismissed during the preliminary inquiry, two were sent to stand trial in the High Court, Stoddard being one of them.
“The prosecution's case was that he (Stoddard) had facilitated the robbery by making available a vehicle that was used in the committing of the crime. They are saying that the vehicle that was used was a vehicle he had rented from a Mr Craig Winter who is a renter of vehicles, he owned a car company in the BVI,” explained Mr Johnson.
He maintained throughout the High Court trial and in the Appeal hearing that there was no evidence that it was in fact that vehicle but even if it was, there certainly was no evidence that Stoddard had facilitated or made the vehicle available to persons to use in the commission of the bank robbery.
“I had made a no case submission to the judge at the time of the trial (Justice Rita Joseph-Olivetti) which was rejected but on appeal the court of Appeal felt strongly that there was no evidence on which a jury properly directed could have convicted and so that the trial judge should not have allowed the case to go to the jury and so they quashed the conviction,” said Mr Johnson. This judgment was passed some two weeks ago.
The unfortunate side of the matter was that Mr Stoddard would have already served the time of the sentence which was five long years and was discharged back in 2010 – 2011 according to Mr Johnson, “but the conviction has been overturned and quashed.”
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