AN Arima man will receive compensation for an arrest in 2019 when police alleged he was engaging in prostitution. On Thursday, Justice Kevin Ramcharan ordered compensation for Marshall Eneau, 57, who was arrested by police while driving through a Housing Development Corporation (HDC) development because he wanted to see the options available there as he previously applied for housing.
Ramcharan ruled there was no evidence to suggest Eneau was engaged in any activity relating to prostitution to give the police a reason to arrest him.
Nine hours after his arrest, he was released from the Arima police station but said he was not given any reason for his arrest and detention until he read the State’s defence that he was arrested with another woman under the suspicion of prosecution and aiding and abetting the offence of prostitution.
At the trial, Eneau insisted there was no one else in his car when he was arrested and the only time he saw a female was when he was put in the trunk of the police vehicle and she was in the back seat.
He also emphatically denied the State’s allegation that he paid a woman for sex, saying it was “wholly untrue and outrageous.”
“I was shocked by the allegations made against me, where it states that I was arrested along with another woman under the suspicion of prostitution and aiding and abetting the offence of prostitution,” Eneau said in his evidence.
He also said he no longer had confidence in the police and continued to suffer stress and embarrassment because the officers alleged his involvement in prostitution.
In his ruling, Ramcharan said even if he accepted the State’s witnesses, there was no evidence there was reasonable or probable cause to arrest Eneau. He ordered the State to pay $50,000 with 2.5 per cent interest from January 1, 2021 to January 11, 2024.
Eneau was represented by attorney Abdel Mohammed.