WESTERN BUREAU – Constable Sean Johnson, who has been charged with the March shooting of minibus operator Fabian Gordon at the Sangster International Airport, is booked to re-appear in court on July 1 when his case will again be mentioned.

He was granted bail in the sum of $100,000 when he appeared in the Western Regional Gun Court on Tuesday.

Late last month, Director of Public Prosecutions Kent Pantry ruled that the constable should be charged with unlawful wounding and malicious destruction of property. The ruling came weeks after the case file was submitted to him by head of the Bureau of Special Investigation (BSI) Granville Gause.

Johnson was arrested and charged on Tuesday and brought before the courts.

There are conflicting reports surrounding the March 27th shooting of Gordon.

According to the police, at about 11:30 am Gordon was driving his Toyota bus with a passenger in it when, on reaching the airport’s pedestrian crossing, he hit a policeman who fell to the ground.

Gordon, the police said, then attempted to run the bus over the injured cop, who was lying on the ground.

The injured lawman, the police said, fired a shot which hit Gordon in the neck.

But eyewitnesses to the incident claimed that the bus did not hit the cop.

According to them, Gordon had stopped his vehicle in front of the pedestrian crossing to allow persons to cross. The policeman pounded on the side of the bus, saying the bus had hit him and there was an argument between the two men during which Gordon was shot, eyewitnesses said.

After the shooting, persons sympathetic to Gordon and/or angry with the police protested at the heavily-used airport through which 70 per cent of the island’s visitors enter and leave the island.

ACP Gause was hurriedly sent to Montego Bay to lead an investigation into the shooting.

Within three weeks after the incident the case file was submitted to the DPP for a ruling.