Buju Banton: Five More Years in Jail

After the gun count was dismissed, Buju was sentenced to ten years on the two remaining drug charges.

This summer, however, an Atlanta appeals court, at the behest of the federal prosecutor, overturned Moody's decision. The judge has few options but to add the mandatory five years to Buju's sentence later this month.

Jonathan Mannion

Options are running out for Buju Banton.

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• Buju Banton
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Even Susan Devlin, a bespectacled redhead and one of the two jurors who initially voted guilty, is queasy over the prospect of the reggae star's getting more time. "None of us thought that he had anything to do with [the gun]," she says. "When the judge threw it out, I thought, 'That's good,' because we really didn't want to charge him with the gun."

In light of these revelations from jurors, one can't help but wonder why the feds have gone to such extremes to lock up one of the most critically important voices to come out of Jamaica since Bob Marley. (Of course, Buju is also well-known for homophobic lyrics, which have angered almost as many people as his songs have pleased.)

Options are running out, but Chokwe Lumumba , Buju's newly appointed attorney, is already planning an appeal. "The result on the gun charge is obviously unjust. And I can see full well why the judge saw fit to throw it out," Lumumba says. "Buju wasn't even there when the gun was possessed. There's very flimsy evidence as far as we can see that he would have actually known what was going on."