Circumstances Surrounding Warner’s Death a Mystery

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Friday, 11 May 2012 02:30

By Alex Holder

Antigua St John's - Almost two years after the death of former APUA employee Colin ‘Relic’ Warner, Chairman of the Antigua Public Utilities Authority Clarvis Joseph appeared reluctant to disclose the results of the internal investigation conducted by APUA.

Warner died while working to restore electricity to the English Harbour area following the passage of Hurricane Earl in 2010. APUA had launched an investigation into the matter less than 24 hours after and the investigation was said to have been completed within four months.

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Caribarena.com contacted Clarvis Joseph on Thursday and he said, “The young man is resting in peace. Leave him alone,” before snappishly ending a telephone conversation.

Public Relations Officer for APUA Cathorna Samuel said prior to the recent inquiry by Caribarena that only the APUA Chairman had the authority to release the findings of the internal probe.

Senior Sergeant William Holder, Spokesman of the Royal Police Force of Antigua, said his office has not kept abreast with the progress of the investigations from the side of the police.

He said too that the force would still need to lease with the APUA for statements of protocol and otherwise since the force had no experts in the field.

"We are not the experts in it to determine what they would do from here on" Holder said. “We would have to wait on expert evidence and take it from there.”

The police spokesman added that the matter would have been viewed as an accident and while the police would normally investigate, if they cannot find someone culpable, there is only so far the investigation could go.

Holder could not say whether or not the case was still open but had promised to take a look.

He also said, "There are some things, depending on the occupation, that are considered occupational hazard and within the workplace they provide coverage for those. It is like police officers that are covered while in the line of duty,” Holder said.

“That is their internal investigation. I can’t say if they can be forced to share that information with the public. Maybe the family had an opportunity to see it but I’m not sure about the public. It is like in the case of an inquest where the public is not obligated to know the cause of death…”

A source close to the operations of the police told Caribarena.com the Antigua Public Utilities Authority was not required to submit that information to the public since it is an internal investigation, but as far as he was aware, the coroner has not yet resolved the matter.

“APUA launched an investigation to see how best they can protect their employee and from my information the minutest of repairs requires them to shut off the power,” the source said.

Caribarena.com has further sought an update into the investigation of the matter involving 17-year-old Xavier Jackson of Sweetes, who died on Monday April 2.

A postmortem investigation had later confirmed that the lad had died from cardiac arrest due to severe electric shock and the police had said investigations were still ongoing. But Holder could not provide an update into the status of this case due to the fact that the police would need the assistance of the Antigua Public Utilities Authority.



Jackson died while tending to the family donkey and reports have suggested an illegal electrical connection to be responsible for the incident.

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