A PRIVATE criminal charge against Prime Minister Patrick Manning was thrown out by Chief Magistrate Sherman McNicolls yesterday, because the woman who filed the charge was absent from the courtroom.

Manning, who appeared through his attorney Michael Quamina, later waved to reporters as his convoy stopped for a moment outside the St Vincent Street, Port of Spain courthouse, moments after the dismissal.

Natasha Cumberbatch had claimed that Manning used annoying language with intent to provoke her to breach the peace on May 21 in Port of Spain.

The matter was originally scheduled to come up for hearing before the Port of Spain Second Magistrate’s Court, but around 9.15 a.m. a clerk announced that the matter had been transferred to the Eighth Court, where McNicolls presided.

When the matter was called before McNicolls at 9.20 a.m., Cumberbatch’s name was called twice by a police officer but there was no response. McNicolls then dismissed the matter, along with a similar complaint made against Michael Vasqueo, seconds before Cumberbatch entered the courtroom.

Told that both matters were dismissed because of her non-appearance, Cumberbatch then went to the First Court before Magistrate Cheron Raphael, where she had two separate complaints accusing her stepfather, Stephen Joefield, and her mother, Charmaine Joefield, of using annoying language on May 10 at McCarthy Street, San Juan.

Cumberbatch later told members of the media that she would make all her comments in court. She was later informed that she had 21 days to relay the charges against Manning before a Justice of the Peace.

While her complaint against Manning was being heard, the Express was told that Cumberbatch was in the Port of Spain First Court awaiting her matters to be called. A police officer told the Express that all her matters were transferred to the First Court from the Second Court because the sitting Magistrate, Christine Charles, was on vacation. The matters involving her parents were adjourned to November 18 and transferred to the Second Court.

Raphael was told by a police officer that the complaints against Manning and Vasqueo, which were also on the list of matters before the magistrate, had already been ’dealt with’ and Raphael said that the matters must have been ’wrongly listed’.