April Timeline
After roughly four hours of deliberation, a jury found lawyer Julian Hall not guilty of all five charges of stealing half a million dollars from a former client. Mr. Hall, 55, of, Southampton, was tried before Chief Justice Richard Ground on charges of using a power of attorney over an elderly client, Betty Lorraine McMahon, to steal a total of $551,044 between November 1995 and February 1996.
Pope John Paul II died on April 2.
Two former Dunkley?s Dairy employees, Michael Madeiros, 41 and Steven Flood, 39, were convicted of conspiracy to import close to $3 million worth of marijuana in October 2003. They were sentenced to ten years imprisonment. The two were found guilty in February following a dramatic Supreme Court trial which saw then Shadow Health Minister Michael Dunkley testify as a witness for the Crown as well as the emergence of allegations of Police brutality ? resulting in six narcotics officers being charged with assault. The drugs, which were concealed in boxes labelled as graphic art materials, were detected by American Customs officials on the dock in Salem, New Jersey, en route to the Island. In collaboration with local narcotics officers, a small portion of the cannabis was allowed to continue on to Bermuda, where the boxes were eventually collected by Flood at the Devonshire dairy under the eye of a Police surveillance operation.
Two new resorts opened their doors ? Wyndham Resort and Spa and Nine Beaches.
An employee at the Fairmont Southampton?s Whaler Inn was burned in a massive fireball which destroyed the beach shop and damaged the lower section of the building. The blast occurred after the man accidentally set his arm on fire while testing a ?Tiki-lamp? for a beach party. Flammable liquid from the lamp dripped on a table cloth and ignited 40 other torches. Another employee threw a wet towel on the injured man ? preventing his burns from being more serious.
Calvin White, one of the key figures in the pay-to-play controversy was removed as chairman of the Public Funds Investment Committee. It followed an article in Mid-Ocean News which described a lunch organised by the CEO of Philadelphia-based Fiduciary Investment Solutions, Tina Byles Poitevien, also the Government?s pension fund consultant, and Tourism and Transport Minister Ewart Brown. At the luncheon in Washington, D.C., about a dozen current or potential investment managers of Bermuda?s pension funds were allegedly asked to pay $2,500 each to Dr. Brown in order to attend.
Four Canadian women, of which one was pregnant, were robbed and attacked as they walked along South Shore in Warwick on April 27.
Trimingham?s launched its going-out-of-business sales. While cosmetics and fragrance were on sale at a discount, the store was offering price cuts in other departments that were never usually discounted. The crystal department was quite busy with customers eyeing Waterford crystal marked off by ten percent and other brands such as Wedgwood and Baccarat discounted by 20 percent.
British hairdresser Melanie Jane Wedgwood is acquitted on charges of driving without due care and attention. Wedgwood was driving a motor car on the morning of August 7, 2003 when she overtook a bus that had halted at a combined bus stop and crosswalk outside Purvis Primary School on St. Mary?s Road, Warwick. She struck six-year-old Tyaisha Cox ? who had just alighted from the bus ? as she walked ahead of her brother on the crosswalk on their way to summer school. Tyaisha died the following morning in hospital. Magistrate Edward King told the court: ?Unfortunately, rumour mongering has distorted this matter to such an extent that the fangs of the ugly serpent of racial undertones have fired the emotions of some members of this community.?
World hurricane experts predicted an active Atlantic hurricane season for 2005 with 13 named storms and seven hurricanes from June to November. (By December there had been 26 named storms and 14 hurricanes.)
The drugs trial of Patrick Stamp is aborted after a juror is seen with the defendant?s family.
Following several PTSA meetings at Berkeley Institute, parents pushed for a September 2006 opening. But Education and Development Minister Terry Lister assured parents that students would not be placed in an unsafe construction site to continue their studies.