On March 14, 2024 — ten years to the day after the jury’s guilty verdict — the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London quashed the murder convictions of Vybz Kartel (Adidja Palmer), Shawn “Shawn Storm” Campbell, Kahira Jones and Andre St John, the judgment in Campbell and others v The King [2024] UKPC 6 records. The Board sent the question of whether they should face a retrial back to Jamaica’s Court of Appeal.
Juror misconduct
The appeal turned on “Juror X,” whom the trial judge learned had allegedly offered fellow jurors J$500,000 to return a particular verdict. The judge allowed the trial to continue with that juror still seated; under Section 31 of the Jury Act, a murder trial could not proceed with fewer than eleven jurors after another juror had been discharged in February. Lord Lloyd-Jones, writing for a unanimous panel, found that decision “fatal to the safety of the convictions which followed” and an infringement of the defendants’ constitutional right to a fair hearing, the BBC reports.
What the ruling did not decide
Having quashed the convictions on juror misconduct alone, the Privy Council did not rule on the defence’s other grounds, including challenges to the admissibility of telephone evidence. Kartel remained in custody pending the Court of Appeal’s decision on a retrial. His attorney Isat Buchanan said: “Yesterday Mr. Palmer was a convicted felon, today he is an innocent man,” the Gleaner quoted.
Why it matters
The Privy Council ruling did not exonerate Kartel on the facts of the case — it held that the 2014 trial process was fundamentally flawed. The decision reopened one of the most closely watched legal sagas in Jamaican entertainment history and set the stage for the Court of Appeal’s ruling four months later.
Listen and dig deeper
- Browse Vybz Kartel and Shawn Storm in the JamaicansMusic library.
- Full report: Privy Council quashes Vybz Kartel’s murder conviction. Previously: The 2014 murder conviction. Next: Kartel walks free (July 2024).
Sources: Judicial Committee of the Privy Council — Campbell and others v The King [2024] UKPC 6 (Mar 14, 2024); BBC Newsbeat — “Vybz Kartel: Jamaica dancehall star’s murder conviction overturned”; The Guardian — conviction quashed report; Jamaica Gleaner — “Kartel and company no longer convicts” (Mar 15, 2024).
Editor’s note: This entry is part of the JamaicansMusic online museum — a career timeline assembled from the archive. It is dated to the era it documents; every claim is drawn from the linked sources.