DAYS OF OUTRAGE and speculation came to a climax in the Bridgetown Traffic Court yesterday.
And, it was over within six minutes.
Heightened security, which began on Monday afternoon when news broke that the two men accused of murdering six women in the Campus Trendz fire would be appearing in a barricaded courtyard under watchful and heavily armed members of the Special Services Unit yesterday, ended with 21-year-old Renaldo Anderson Alleyne, of Prescod Bottom, Hindsbury Road, St Michael, and 19-year-old Jamar DeWayne Orlando Bynoe, of Headley Land, Bank Hall, St Michael, being hustled in and back out of court.
The expected angry and vocal crowd did not materialise.
It was only a few who gathered in the shade by the Montefiore Fountain – well away from the District “A” Magistrates’ Court.
From early morning, security guards and lawmen were stopping and checking people at the entrance to the Coleridge Street compound, scanning them and asking them to declare their business.
Those who were allowed in were then restricted to under the arch of the courtyard; the normally busy area barricaded, with lawmen preventing further access to anyone who did not have business in the court.
By midday, the complement of lawmen had swelled and by then included gazetted officers and members of the Special Services Unit.
At 1:10 p.m., accused Alleyne was the first of the two to be hustled into the court. Hot on his heels was Bynoe. Each was surrounded by a group of lawmen.
They were led into the dock but not a word did the two utter – they were not required to – and no emotion did they display.
Within six minutes of Magistrate Christopher Birch’s reading of 12 charges to the two and ordering that they be kept on remand for the next 28 days, Alleyne and Bynoe were removed from the dock; and under armed guard were hastily escorted to the cells of Central Police Station to await transportation to HMP Dodds.
