Jamaican police officer charged with murder after woman shot during protest

Authorities in Jamaica have taken the rare step of charging a police officer with murder after he was accused of shooting a 45-year-old woman in a case that prompted violent protests.

According to the Independent Commission of Investigations (Indecom), Constable Andrew Wilson appeared in court on Wednesday and was denied bail. Another hearing is scheduled for mid-June.

The killing of Latoya “Buju” Bulgin on 17 May in north-west Jamaica sparked protests after footage circulated on social media showing an officer firing at her vehicle during a demonstration over police violence.

According to Indecom, police were “conducting crowd control duties” during a protest in Granville, St James, against a police shooting days earlier, in which 17-year-old Tjey Edwards, identified by local media as Bulgin’s cousin, was killed.

In the CCTV footage, Bulgin’s minivan is seen stationary at the side of the road as several people climb out. Police officers can be seen standing nearby. With one of the side doors still open, the vehicle starts to pull out into the road.

Apparently without warning, an officer standing a few feet in front of the vehicle pulls a handgun and shoots at the driver, amid screams and cries from people nearby. Some people are seen running.

Police officers are seen dragging Bulgin’s limp body out of the car and on to the ground and putting her in the back of a police pickup truck. The officers do not appear to make any attempt to offer first aid to the injured woman.

Indecom and Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ), a human rights group, have been calling for strengthened accountability in police fatal shootings through mechanisms such as body-worn cameras. No body camera was worn by the police officer accused of shooting Bulgin, and JFJ said the incident demonstrated the importance of independent footage.

“Without the availability of that CCTV footage, we would not be in the position to even be having this conversation and we would not perhaps have seen the JCF high command responding,” the group’s executive director, Mickel Jackson, told Radio Jamaica News last month.

In a statement on Wednesday, Indecom said the “prompt collection and analysis of video evidence” during its independent investigation into Bulgin’s death “assisted in establishing an objective understanding of this fatal shooting incident”.

The commission has reported 140 fatal shootings so far this year in the country of 2.8 million people. Last year, JFJ staged a protest against what it described as a “significant and alarming” increase in fatal shootings by police.

The PNP Women’s Movement, a branch of the opposition People’s National party, said the CCTV footage “raises serious questions about the use of lethal force by members of the security forces”.

It also said it was “disturbing” how Bulgin’s body was thrown into the back of a police vehicle after she was shot. “This conduct falls below the respect that should be afforded to our citizens by members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force,” the group said.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights denounced Bulgin’s killing and urged a “prompt, independent, impartial and transparent inquiry”.

With reporting by the Associated Press