DEAR PIP, FREE THIS NIGGA OR JAIL ME

FREE AUGUSTIN ‘FAREWELL’ PIERRE

PROSTATE CANCER VICTIM DIDN’T MURDER ANYONE IN THE FIRST PLACE

An Open Letter to Philip J Pierre, Chairman of the Mercy Committee and the Best Person To Lead St Lucia Now That We Know Kenny, Allen, Richard, Stephenson and even Alva and Gail are all duds.

 

Dear Mr Pierre,

I’ll try not to waste your time.

Augustin “Farewell” Pierre was the captain of a boat, when 30 years ago he was convicted of murder for a homicide that any reasonable person could see was a reaction to repeated aggravated assault.

The short version of the story is that a bunch of Lucians and a French Ras on Farewell’s boat where trying to get from Laba to Luci when they drifted out to sea. A fella named Tony (why is it always some guy named Tony?) was so vexed that he took the habit of beating the captain with a mop stick every now and then.

This went on for days. Lost at sea. Mopstick. Lone captain trying to row six or seven people home against the tide. Mop stick. Water running out. Mop stick. Food running out. Mop stick. Ship passes by in the distance without seeing the boat lost at sea. Mop stick in Farewell’s face and ass.

And all the time, he has to be rowing, desalinating and trying to assure the other passengers of their eventual safety.

Mopstick.

So one day, Farewell stabbed Tony and threw him overboard. Sigh.

None of the other passengers who tried to stop the fight tried to rescue Tony. They didn’t like it, but not only was everyone half crazy from starvation, dehydration, heatstroke and stress…Farewell was only person who knew anything about surviving the sea.

The Venezuelan coast guard found them and brought them to a nearby base to recuperate. Then they sent them home.

Farewell never denied stabbing Tony and throwing him overboard. He just didn’t think he murdered him. I mean, if not Tony has just talked his talk instead of lashing mop stick in man face on daily basis, he might be alive today.

But the court didn’t think so. Even though they have no jurisdiction in international waters, they went ahead and threw this man’s life away.

And so, Farewell lingered in the dungeons at Her Majesty’s Gaol in Castries, endured the factory prison life after the prison fire and then christened Custody Suites as one of the first generation of Bordelais’ inmates when the new prison was commissioned at a whopping cost of FAR MORE THAN ANY GOVERNMENT EVER SPENT ON A SCHOOL OR UNIVERSITY IN ONE YEAR.

Now, Farewell is not just an old man.

He’s practically a dead man.

He has medical issues. After growing old in prison, his friend Dale Elliot reports that he is dying of prostate cancer.

Dale, of course, is trying to do a documentary on him.

And I am trying to either free him or join him in jail.

You see, if this is justice in St Lucia, I am already a criminal and don’t belong among decent, law-abiding, upstanding moral Christians like Kenny and Peter Foster and Richard Frederick and all these other upstanding gentlemen of silk, steel, honor, God, letters and luxury watches.

I am asking my dear friend Philip J Pierre, as the only decent Neg Marron in Cabinet since Fetty Bousquet to use his power as Chairman of the Mercy Committee to free Augustin ‘Farewell’ Pierre. (Calixte George doesn’t count he was appointed by the shabines, not elected by the Neg.)

Don’t waste time on this, comrade.

Your Mercy Committee is already unopened can of worms. You can redeem the entire two and a half year failure by acting swiftly on this one matter.

Augustin ‘Farewell’ Pierre didn’t murder anyone. He stabbed a man who had not only threatened violence, but fulfilled every brutal promise he made and then some.

He did so under tremendous duress.

In fact, no one in that boat was in their right mind. They were delirious, hysterical and irrational. When Farewell threw Tony into the sea, none of them made the logical, ethical decision to jump in the water with the rope to save the bleeding, injured man.

All they had left was enough self-preservation to feel bad as the current took him away.

All Farewell did was act like anyone would. With nothing left, his instinct acted to preserve his life.

Call it crazy. Call it self defense. Call it manslaughter.

But that’s not murder. Get this man out of jail, please.

Please.