NASSAU-Social media sensation Alesha ‘Car Wash’ McNeil no longer has a criminal record after the Court of Appeal quashed her child cruelty conviction today.
McNeil, 23, spent 21 days in prison before she was freed on $1,500 bail, pending appeal on July 7.
While unrepresented McNeil admitted the charge at her arraignment on June 15. Prosecutors agreed that a “material irregularity” occurred when Deputy Chief Magistrate Andrew Forbes accepted the guilty plea.
The Court acquitted McNeil and did not order a retrial.
Shortly after the decision, McNeil went live on Facebook and thanked her legal team of Wayne Munroe QC, Ryszard Humes and Bjorn Ferguson.
She exclaimed, “I won my appeal fair and square. Who God keeps is well kept. … No more bail, no more case, Car Wash is free.”
Magistrate Forbes jailed McNeil for three months after accepting her guilty plea.
Police arrested McNeil after she beat her boyfriend’s seven-year-old son with a belt on June 4.
The child’s mother filed a complaint with police after seeing marks on the child’s back.
But McNeil told the magistrate that the boy’s father gave her permission to discipline him.
According to McNeil, she beat the boy because he was more interested in singing her song than learning how to read and write.
She became a household name after videos of the full-figured woman dancing went viral.
Daddi Whites drops appeal
Meanwhile, another social media personality formally abandoned his child cruelty conviction.
Comedian and performer Jonathan “Daddi Whites” Russell and Lionel Hart Sr. decided against contesting their June 15 child cruelty convictions.
Magistrate Forbes jailed them after a video of Hart holding his two-year-old son as Russell put a beer bottle to the toddler’s mouth went viral.
In court, Russell denied that the bottle contained beer. According to him, it was really soda. As for Hart, he said he didn’t know what was in the bottle.
With time off for good behaviour, they will be released from prison on August 15.
