(Observation) – For the past couple of months, the police at La Penitence was bombarded with complaints from two old people, one being around 80-years-old; – about a 27-year-old man that has been terrorizing and beating his old aunt almost every week.

It practically took more than twenty complaints, and the intervention of the Crime Chief Paul Williams to have the man arrested, thus saving an old woman from a possible violent death.

The man in question is Carl Mangal, a man who was rescued by the same aunt, after his own mother threw him out because of the violence he displays every time he smokes marijuana.

His mother is living on the upper floor of a two bedroom children-inherited property, while the aunt is living downstairs.

But even though the man was terrorizing his own mother before being thrown out, his kind-hearted old aunt took him in, and the man, in turn, took in a woman, and the list goes on.

Weeks later, the same treatment that the man was giving to his mother whenever he smokes his marijuana, soon became the same violent treatment that the man began to give his aunt.

Over time, the old woman could have taken it no more, and began to run to the police day in and day out, in an effort to get the man out of her house.

But for whatever reason, the man was always one step ahead of the police at La Penitence.

So after the crime chief intervened with a special squad, and the man was arrested, police carried out their normal search, and found the man with a quantity of marijuana.

The man who repeatedly admitted that the marijuana belonged to him, was then charged and brought before the court, where he pleaded guilty, and happily went about his business to serve his minimum three-year sentence.

Days later, a group of people who wants marijuana to be legalize began to make some noise, while Attorney-at-law Nigel Hughes pick up himself, pull a publicity stunt, and then get the man out on bail pending an appeal.

Some supporters of marijuana decriminalization have since taken to social media and hailed Carl Mangal as a hero.

Poor granny would have to be prepared for what might be coming next.

I pray that this does not turn out to be the case, but don’t be surprised if you see a news headline with the quote “Granny battered to death by marijuana-deranged nephew” in the local press, in the weeks or months to come.

In such a case, I don’t know what Mr. Hughes will say.

For now, most people might dismiss Mr. Hughes intervention to set a marijuana deranged man free, as a move by a man who is battling for justice, for the poor.

But is it a case where Mr. Nigel Hughes is so entwined in the corridors of law that he lacks the capacity to effectively process certain social ills in a manner that is sane and conducive to the expectations of societal civility?

Or was it a case where Carl Mangal is being used as a scapegoat to drum up public support for the decriminalization of marijuana use.

If that was the case, I can tell you that I am reliably informed (and do believe) that even if by some miracle, parliament passes an act for the decriminalization of marijuana use, President Granger would not be signing it into law.

So for now, it is an exercise in vain.

There are a number of reasons why the President won’t sign it into law.

Apart from three other identified reasons, I am told that the higher echelons of the government believe that there is a group of people, both inside and outside of parliament who probably collected inducements from a marijuana network to advance their interest here.

After all, they are eager to set up shop here.

The United States believes the same thing too. Their current silence does not mean that they don’t know.

Time will deal with that issue though. Believe me.

Nonetheless, I would agree with Basil Williams SC, when he suggested that pushing the law any further to appease marijuana users, should be a decision that should be first put to a referendum.

Plain and simple.

In that way, the Guyanese people will be the ones that will make the decision; – not some parliamentarians or lobbying men, whose hands are probably deep in the marijuana oligarchs pockets.

For more on this story go to: https://www.guyanaguardian.com/man-terrorized-beat-granny-hailed-hero/