Second charge levelled at Ombudsboy may be thrown out

He was originally charged with extortion and today a second charge was laid against thirty-three year old Lionel Castillo. Castillo, who is the former Investigator in the Office of the Ombudsman, appeared in Magistrates’ Court on a charge of Agreement for Influencing an Officer. The allegation is that on June seventeenth, 2007, Castillo accepted five thousand dollars from prison inmate, Kelvin Reneau and pledged to influence three officials to grant Reneau parole. The police action may have been premature, however, as Magistrate Dorothy Flowers did not take a plea from Castillo. This is because the Director of Public Prosecutions, Lutchman Sooknandan, has yet to decide if the offence can be tried on indictment in the Supreme Court. If it cannot, then it will be struck out because the six month statute of limitations within which the charge could be prosecuted has expired. Castillo was allowed to leave the court without posting any bail. The D.P.P’s decision will be announced on January twenty-third when Castillo returns to court to face the original extortion charge. He was charged for this offence on August first, 2007, three days after he allegedly accepted one thousand five hundred dollars from Reneau.