The entertainer is on trial to answer to charges of possession and cultivation of ganja. He stood in the dock in a light green suit and black inside shirt with his locks pulled back from his face and denied to the court that he was the supervisor of the garden, neither that he frequently visited the garden nor that he said the marijuana was used to give him inspiration to sing his music.

In the previous hearing, the Crown's sole witness, Detective Corporal Phillip Dodd told the court that Banton had said, "Yeah man, go lock mi up at di station fi di likkle weed dat give me inspiration fi write mi music," when Dodd showed him the uprooted ganja and told him of the charges.

Dodd's testimony is that on December 3 at approximately 7:30 p.m., he and a member of a police party, led by commanding officer of St. Andrew North Division, Superintendent Assan Thompson were on a special operation in the area. A suspicious character ran unto the premises, they pursued him. Their chase led them to other findings. Dodd removed a licensed firearm from the entertainer and later discovered the plants growing in a well tended garden.

Yet, the entertainer painted a different picture in his testimony. He told the court that the officers were less than cordial, called him a "dutty rasta" on two occassions and searched the compound without showing him a warrant.

"I do not earn my bread by cultivating ganja..." the Gargamel told the court adamantly. "Those plants (ganja) were not in my garden."

Conflicting evidence

However, the DJ gave conflicting evidence during his testimony. Though he told the court he would not consider himself the supervisor of the garden, he admitted to paying the gardener, only known as "Elder", a salary and on occasion quarelling with him for not maintaining the garden.

He also told the court that he only visited the garden not more than five times in the short times he returned to the country in 2002 but was unable to recall the last time he visited the garden in 2003 outside of December 3.

Banton told the Crown that the garden was not an integral part of the day to day running of his studio. The Crown disagreed citing that the fact that he had brought seeds from Europe and told his father to get top soil to improve the quality of the soil that he, in fact, visited the garden much more frequently than he admitted. However, Banton insisted he was not misleading the court. He had said that he would stand on his verandah and look over into the garden but he had not gone physically into the garden frequently.

Though he had a tabernacle in the rear of the property beside the garden, where he often "burn fire", he insisted that he did not physically start the fires but would participate in a ceremonial ritual. He told the court that he had not performed the ceremony since 2002.

Banton seemed agitated during the proceedings and even asked the Crown where he was going with his questioning when he did not see the relevance. He told the court that on December 3, Dodd used the ganja plant to strike an engineer. However, the engineer, Austin Green, told the court that he was not aware that the plant was a ganja plant nor would he recognize the odour of a green ganja plant. He also could not determine how big the plant was that was allegedly used to strike him. Yet, he insisted that the hit had been an intentional one.

"When he was walking away with Mark (Banton) [to the station] and I said to dem, "Doan worry, he (Banton) soon come out", he (Dodd) turn back and hit me." Green showed the court a medical report to show that he had suffered swelling in the face and had to be treated.