He does not have a drug problem, said Shirlon McDonald Dowell.
And the reason he once had no fixed of abode was because lawmen had evicted him from his home.
Dowell, 61, of Bedford Lane, Roebuck Street, The City, made these assertions when he appeared in the District “A” Magistrates’ Court last week, where he pleaded guilty to having cannabis, as well as a cocaine pipe on February 16.
Magistrate Douglas Frederick convicted, reprimanded and discharged him for the cannabis, and for the apparatus, sentenced him to six months in prison but suspended it for six months.
“I ain’t really hooked on cocaine,” he said in his defence. “I am a steel bender and I was working with a man in Grazettes.
“I was living at home and when the police put me out of my house, I end up on the streets.”
Prosecutor Sergeant Theodore McClean told the court lawmen were at Bedford Lane when they saw the senior citizen sitting under a shed.
He tried to hide a ginseng bottle when he saw police but they confiscated it and arrested him.
While he was at the station, he was searched and the cannabis was found in the right pocket of the jacket he was wearing.
Dowell told police: “I can’t believe I left that weed in there.” (HLE)
