> “The evidence as it stands in my humble opinion is that the officer acted lawfully and exercised his lawful discretion in firing his weapon that day," he said, "but as of late there have been a lot of issues that have surfaced in relation to the police and I think that contributed to the verdict. The jury is only supposed to consider the evidence before the court, but at the end of the day we live in this society and social media is available to everybody.”

>Mr Ferguson believes jurors were uncomfortable with the fact that police investigate police shootings, a point Mrs Farquharson Seymour stressed during the inquest.

Our trial system requires us to be judged by our peers, many of whom have been dumbed down by public education policy failures of successive governments. The average juror today is D- educated and borderline illiterate. Such individuals are very vulnerable to the public sentiment of the day as espoused by irresponsible human rights activists and equally irresponsible politicians pandering for publicity and political support from such activists and their supporters. For quite sometime now there has been an increasing anti-police sentiment in our country born out of the increased incidence of poverty and crime associated with it, as well as the sub-standard quality of new police recruits, many of whom are D- educated themselves. All of this is headed one way. If our law enforcement officers believe they will never get a fair hearing in court for their actions, then they will be much less inclined use the force and tools necessary to apprehend suspected criminals and protect our society at large. The implications of a pervasively strong anti-police sentiment should never be under estimated.

Bottomline: Government's continued failure to properly address our failed public education system, which dumps thousands of D- educated 'graduates' on us each year, is tearing down the legitimacy of most institutions in our country, not least of which is our political system, our legal system (especially trial by jury), the quality of our law enforcement, and on and on. In fact, our failed public education system is the root of most of most serious problems confronting our country. Everyone knows our failed public education system is choked with illegal alien children and consequently grossly under-resourced. Successive governments, including the Minnis-led FNM government, have sat back and taken the attitude that there never could be enough financial resources to fix our failed public education system, so why bother.

very well put @ well_mudda!

I'm wondering if the shooting of the victim was wrong or was it wrong only because he was killed. In other words if the officer shot him in the legs a few times, would that have been considered unjustified as well?

No police officer could ever get a fair hearing by a jury of his peers. The jury pool is just much too contaminated by the strong anti-police sentiment that exists everywhere in Bahamian society today. It's impossible for the jury selection process to weed out such a pervasive sentiment. That's the harsh and sad reality of it all. Our trial by jury system is now so severely dysfunctional, as a result of too many all too easily manipulated D- educated jurors, that there may be no possible way of fixing it. Today a lot of innocent people go to prison and a lot of guilty people stay out of prison. That's a complete melt down of the justice system one would normally find in a Banana Republic.

I would not count of suing yet. . .the justice system is not finished. . .the Appeals Court. . .better legal minds will go over the case. . .this case is in good hands yet!! I also do not want a "loose cannon" police on our streets. . .the next person he goes postal on may be me or mine!! On the other hand. . .I don't want a good officer "shafted" by a group of criminals and a low life lawyer. . .so lets wait and see what the AC says!!

We can ill-afford a court system with a very weak rung anywhere on its ladder. Very weak minds on our lower courts only means log-jam case loads for the better minds on our higher courts which eventually takes a toll on the quality of justice despatched higher up on the ladder. The Privy Council in England has been complaining for years now about the number of cases coming to it from the Bahamas that evidence weak minded rungs on our court system ladder. The standing joke among the Law Lords in England is that dumb elected officials are very seldom capable of, or willing to, appoint smart minded judges who are comfortable in their skin.

No one knows the sorrow of mothers who have lots their children.
being sick is bad enough but sudden death is worse.

May Ms. Rolle take comfort in Mary the Mother of Jesus,