On August 25, 2012 BU family member, the venerable Yardbroom, a posted the following comment:
“Reports are that Mr. Vernon Smith QC “RECALLED” Alexandra’s Deputy Principal Beverley Neblett-Lashley and Former Secretary Merlene Sealey to give evidence again before the COI. It is alleged after which “Smith, who questioned the deputy Principal and former secretary, then submitted that there was no evidence before the Commission proving that the allegations against Broomes were true.”
Do you know what questions were asked of them and what their responses were?”
BU tapped its legal resources for an answer and the following is what has been reported to us.
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In giving her evidence before the Commission, the deputy principal, Beverley Neblett-Lashley, who we will refer to as “Lashley”, introduced a certain document which was supported by the evidence of former secretary, Merlene Sealey, who we will refer to as “Sealey”.
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This document pertains to an incident in 2003-2004 involving a certain pupil, whom we shall call “Miss X” and her transfer from Combermere to Alexandra.
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In effecting the transfer, Principal Jeff Broomes (“Broomes”) sought the scholastic records of Miss X from Combermere and these he received by telephone and scribbled them down on a piece of paper, pending the arrival of the formal records from Combermere, which, in typical Barbados fashion, have never arrived.
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Boomes handed the piece of paper, apparently yellow in colour, to his secretary, as the matter of the transfer of Miss X was to be of a temporary nature, she and her father having decided that she would be better served by going to live with her aunt in Boston and attending school there.
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Miss X had attended 2nd, 3rd and 4th year at Combermere and came to Alexandra for year 5.
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However, as a result of the transfer to Alexandra, which suited her better than Combermere, the idea of Miss X going to live and school in the USA was cancelled.
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It is noted that in the third week of Miss X’s tenure at Alexandra, her form was set a test, which she failed with a score of 19 out of 50. The result of this failure was that the teacher refused to have Miss X in her class. However, Broomes instructed the teacher that she had no right to refuse to teach Miss X and that they were in the business of teaching children, so to get on with it.
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It is noted (without observation or comment on the part of BU) that the subject failed by Miss X was Chemistry and the Teacher who refused to have her in the class and was corrected and contradicted and instructed by Broomes was Miss Amaida Greaves.
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Miss X had enjoyed a spotty career with Chemistry while at Combermere, to the extent that her father had engaged private tuition for her in the person of one of the faculty of St Leonards. It was alleged that this spotty career may have been largely due to the conflict of personalities between Miss X and the teacher at Combermere, a person who is a very close friend of Miss Amaida Greaves.
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Meanwhile, Sealey the Secretary took the paper handed her for filing by Broomes (please recall that this was a temporary note while the official record from Combermere was awaited) and did a transcription on to the letterhead of Alexandra. However, Sealey failed to record that years 2, 3 and 4 were at Combermere and instead entered them as having been at Alexandra.
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Sealey claimed that Broomes had asked her to type up the Transcript to enable Miss X to go to university (not school) in the USA, a plan which, as has been said, had long been shelved.
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Sealey and Lashley produced this transcript to the Commission to advance their claim that Broomes had acted fraudulently. It is noted that Sealey not only failed to get the name of the school (Combermere) at which Miss X had spent years 2, 3 and 4 right, but she also failed to get Miss X’s date of birth and her actual verifiable grades right.
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Sealey and Lashley were recalled to confirm their previous evidence that:
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Sealey said she gave the document to Lashley on her retirement in 2004.
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Lashley claimed that she had received the evidence from Sealey in 2004.
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Sealey claimed that Broomes instructed her to send this document to a school or university in the USA. Please remember that Miss X was in 5th year at Alexandra.
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Upon re-examination by Mr Vernon Smith QC, Sealey claimed:
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She did not remember the name of the school or university in the States that Broomes had instructed her to send the document to.
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Broomes did not give her the name and address of the school or university in writing, but instead, had “told her” verbally. She had not written it down. Presumably because she remembered it, zip code and all, but has since forgotten it.
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She had not given the document to Lashley in 2004, merely told her about it.
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The document had been mailed to the unknown school/university in the States and she did not keep a record – and there is no record in the School’s Mail Book.
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Upon re-examination by Mr Smith, Lashley attested first that she had been away from Alexandra for 4 years, commencing in 2004. She then contradicted her own previous evidence as follows:
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She did not receive the document from Sealey. Instead she took it down off the school computer on August 3, 2012.
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Thus, on the evidence, the document never existed at all until August 3, 2012. AND the document was never seen or approved or signed by Broomes and, as the name of the school or university to which Sealey claims to have sent it are unknown and there is no record for them, there is no evidence that the document claimed by Sealey and Lashley ever existed.
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In the meantime, Miss X, having passed the required number of exams at Alexandra, attended BCC for her “A” levels, in which she distinguished herself. Miss X, having left school, now works.
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It is noted that Miss X’s father has provided an affidavit and testimony in support of the evidence and the contentions of Broomes.
Thus the document designed to demonstrate fraud on the part of Broomes is, on the evidence before the Commission, itself a fraud allegedly perpetrated and perpetuated by Sealey and Lashley. Our legal eagles suggest that, subject to investigation by the Director of Public Prosecutions for which there is now ample grounds especially in light of the status of the Commission, criminal charges of perjury, conspiracy and fraud may well have to be entertained and brought against Sealey and Lashley.
We also take grave issue with the comments of Commissioner Frederick Waterman on the subject of Broomes pitching marbles with the students at Alexandra. Waterman, with the pomposity that comes with age and self-consequence, admonished Broomes thus:
““I don’t believe in that. I don’t see a reason for that,” Waterman told the principal. “If something like that continues there is a possibility they [the students] could lose respect for you. You are the head. You are up there. They are the students, and they are down here,” the commissioner said while gesticulating with his hands in the air.” – Nation August 26, 2012
As Waterman indulged in his fit of pomposity, it was seen that Mr Vernon Smith QC (Waterman’s first cousin and older that Waterman) put his head down in his hands in what later turned out to have been complete total embarrassment as he, Mr Smith, a former teacher at Harrison College, used to stop and pitch marbles with his pupils himself and he doubtless remembers many members of the HC staff doing the same thing – people like Winston “Heads” Marshall and the like – without in any way impairing their authority with the student body. Quite the contrary as this sort of informal social exchange is proved by studies (obviously NOT read by Waterman) to enhance the effectiveness of teachers. Which, if he had any current first-hand knowledge of education, Mr Waterman would know. Obviously his own school days are now so distant as to be unremembered, if not illusory.
Follow the COI from the beginning (in descending order):
