Members of the Rastafarian community are calling on the government to empower the office of the public defender, so that it can investigate and prosecute some offences.

The call was made today, as Rastafarians gathered in Sam Sharpe Square St. James, joining their colleagues in Kingston, in protest over the ruling from the director of public prosecutions, in the Nzinga King matter.

King, a Rastafarian woman, had alleged that her locks were cut by a police woman, while being held in jail, in Clarendon.

The DPP ruled that King’s claim had inconsistencies that witnesses said king removed her own hair, and that no charge be laid against the accused cops.

At today’s protest in Montego Bay, member of the Coral Gardens Benevolent Society, Lewis Brown, decried the DPP’s ruling, and questioned the suggestion from the DPP that Nzinga is in need of psychological treatment.

Lewis said, when cases involving oppressed people go through the normal court system, the matters are not given adequate attention, and are dragged on for years.

He wants the public defender to be able to deal with these cases in a special court.