Prisoner to be freed after judge allows appeal

A man who had been jailed after allegedly harassing a girl on the bus is being released from custody, after a judge today allowed an appeal that asserted his imprisonment was grounded in a wrong decision of law.

Last May, Devaun Cox, 29, was sentenced to three years' imprisonment and two years' probation for intruding on the privacy of a girl; it was alleged he made inappropriately suggestive remarks, ogled at the girl in a lewd way and then asked her where she lived and whether he could come home with her.

Today, in Supreme Court, Puisne Judge Stephen Hellman’s judgment suggests Cox was never properly convicted in the first place. There was considerable procedural confusion during the case over whether Cox changed his plea. Cox’s attorney, Kamal Worrell, had argued that he had not changed his plea and was therefore either never convicted or convicted on an erroneous basis.

In his judgment, Judge Hellman wrote: “It appears to me that the ‘conviction’ recorded against Mr Cox should be set aside on the ground of a wrong decision in law, namely the decision of the learned magistrate to sentence him on the basis that he had changed his plea from ‘guilty’ to ‘not guilty’ when he had not.”