Woman’s yawning disturbs court

A parish judge scolded a woman who yawned so loudly that she disrupted proceedings in the Kingston and St Andrew Parish Court on Thursday.

Margaret McLean appeared in court to answer to a charge of exposing goods for sale, an offence which carries a fine of $400 under the Town and Communities Act. As McLean sat in the court's gallows waiting for her name to be called by the prosecutor, she yawned loudly and disturbed the court proceedings. Parish Judge Leighton Morris, who was addressing another matter, immediately stopped and queried the police about what happened.

"Who made that sound?" the concerned judge quizzed.

"Your Honour, this lady did and when I talked to her she say, 'A yawn me did a yawn'," the police reported.

Morris then asked McLean to step into the prisoner's dock and began scolding her for her behaviour.

"You won't think that something is wrong with your behaviour because it is something you do all the time and no one has addressed it. You are not in your living room," the judge stressed.

McLean was arrested on June 12, after she was seen selling tamarinds and 'tinkin' toe' along Upper Waterloo Road.

"Tinkin' toe?" Morris asked in confusion.

"I would normally give people a warning for this offence but your behaviour today is telling me otherwise. What do you have to say for yourself?" he asked further.

"I am so sorry," McLean told the court.

"Pull it together. Learn where to ply your ware, and if you should find yourself back here again, don't come and kotch off in the courtroom like you at your house. This is court," Morris warned. McLean was admonished and discharged.

- T.T.