No special treatment for Maitland

Commissioner of Corrections Brigadier (Ret'd) Radgh Mason has insisted that there will be no special treatment for members of the security forces who are imprisoned.

This follows the guilty verdict against Constable Noel Maitland for the murder of 24-year-old social media influencer and entrepreneur Donna-Lee Donaldson. Mason insisted that all convicted persons are assessed the same within the correctional system.

"Everyone is assessed on admission, and that determines how we accommodate persons. All the usual processes will take place," Mason said. Speaking with THE WEEKEND STAR, Mason explained that a risk assessment is conducted for every convicted individual entering a correctional facility.

"All the circumstances surrounding the person are taken into account to determine how we treat with them," he said. When asked directly whether members of the security forces receive any form of special treatment while incarcerated, Mason was firm.

"All persons are risk assessed and treated as such," he stated.

Following over three hours of deliberation in the Home Circuit Court on Thursday, the jury returned guilty verdicts against Maitland on charges of murder and preventing the lawful burial of a corpse. Donaldson has been missing since July 2022. Her body has never been recovered.

During the trial, Crown counsel presented evidence including bloodstains recovered from Maitland's Chelsea Manor apartment in St Andrew, the removal and disposal of furniture, and phone records tracking Maitland's movements and communications after Donaldson's disappearance. Prosecutors also pointed to what they described as Maitland's calculated behaviour following Donaldson's disappearance, including attempts to mislead investigators and members of Donaldson's family.

Maitland is scheduled to be sentenced on March 13.