A woman who boarded a plane to Cayman, despite knowing she had tested positive for COVID-19 and was displaying visible signs of the virus, has been jailed for four months for breaching Cayman’s COVID-19 entry requirements.
Stephany Clarke, 28, of Jamaica, arrived in Cayman on 9 Sept., aboard Cayman Airways flight KX605 from the Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston, Jamaica.
At the time of her arrival, the then-COVID-19 Suppression and Prevention Regulations required all inbound travellers to produce a negative COVID-19 PCR result from a test taken within 72 hours prior to their arrival in Grand Cayman.
Under those regulations, people who tested positive were not allowed to travel to Cayman.
The regulations also set out a penalty of up to $10,000 and/or imprisonment for two years, if convicted.
Court rejects Clarke’s claims
When sentencing Clarke, Magistrate Angelyn Hernandez said she rejected Clarke’s claims that five trained airport and health staff could have missed her positive result.
“Upon their arrival [Clarke and her partner] were processed by (Customs and Border Control), she produced the [emailed] results for both. Her partner was negative, her result was positive,” said Hernandez.
“During the interaction, she was observed to be displaying COVID-like symptoms and had to be repeatedly told to keep her mask on.”
Reading from her judgment, which includes quotes from a CBC report, Hernandez recalled that, following the initial positive result, Public Health was called and a second PCR test was conducted, which also returned a positive result.
Hernandez also noted that Clarke is alleged to have presented a hard copy of a negative PCR test to Jamaican officials when attempting to board the aircraft.
“By admission of your guilty plea, you accept that you… showing symptoms of COVID-19, willingly boarded a flight and travelled across international jurisdictions despite knowing you were positive for COVID-19,” said Hernandez.
When speaking on behalf of Clarke, her attorney said, “This was a case of naiveté, Ms Clarke’s instructions have always been that she knows she should have read the email, but she didn’t, and instead she showed the email to officials.”
Clarke’s attorney told the court her client passed through three different checkpoints, at the Norman Manley airport, during which she showed the email to a total of five different people – none of whom noticed that her results were positive.
However, Hernandez said, “This court rejects the assertions that five trained individuals could have read that email and not have spotted that the result was positive.”
‘Worst case so far’
Hernandez said Clarke‘s case was the worst of all the COVID-19 regulation breaches to have occurred, and that the only appropriate sentence was that of immediate imprisonment.
In December 2020, US tourist Skylar Mack and her Caymanian partner Vanjae Ramgeet were both sentenced to four months in prison for a “selfish and arrogant quarantine breach”.
In May 2021, the Grand Court upheld a 30-day sentence for visiting Canadian screenwriter Thomas Michael for breaching his quarantine requirements.
“While the true level of risk from your actions is hard to quantify, it is clear that you did put the passengers and crew aboard the flight at risk of contracting COVID-19,” Hernandez said.
“This was a deliberate act with clear intention to deceive…and is the worst case so far.”
Hernandez began with a sentence of six months. She noted that, despite the aggravating factors such as the deceit, there was nothing to prompt an uplift in the sentence.
She then reduced the sentence by one-third, as credit for Clarke’s early guilty plea.
“The sentence of this court is one of four months in prison,” said Hernandez.
No financial penalty was imposed.
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