A Mara­bel­la man, ac­cused of burn­ing the hands of a three-year-old boy and hit­ting him, was warned to have no in­ter­ac­tion with the in­fant as he was grant­ed bail yes­ter­day. Mar­cus John, who has been in cus­tody for more than a month, was grant­ed $60,000 ap­proval bail with a cash bail al­ter­na­tive of $15,000 when he reap­peared in the San Fer­nan­do Mag­is­trates’ Court.

He was al­so warned to stay 150 feet away from the child. The two charges al­leged that on a date un­known in De­cem­ber 2018 and in March 30 this year, he as­sault­ed a child in a man­ner like­ly to cause him phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al suf­fer­ing. John was not asked to plead to the in­dictable charges laid un­der the Chil­dren’s Act by WPC Nicole St John of the Child Pro­tec­tion Unit.

It is al­leged that the child’s hands were held over the lit stove and he was struck in the eye and hit with a ruler on his mouth for be­ing un­able to write a let­ter of the al­pha­bet. One month af­ter his first ap­pear­ance, his preg­nant com­mon-law wife Crys­tal Marchan was al­so charged by St John.(Trinidad Guardian)...[+]