Resh­ma Ra­goonath

Le­gal ar­gu­ments sur­round­ing dis­clo­sure dom­i­nat­ed the court ap­pear­ance of 22-year-old Shaz­ad Ra­jack when he reap­peared in court yes­ter­day charged with the killing of Di­ane Williams and her eight-year-old son, Shaquille. They were killed last month. Their dis­mem­bered, head­less bod­ies were found at the For­res Park Dump, Clax­ton Bay, on Ju­ly 21. Days lat­er their heads were found buried in shal­low graves in Ste Madeleine. Yes­ter­day, Ra­jack made his sec­ond court ap­pear­ance be­fore Se­nior Mag­is­trate An­nette Mc Ken­zie in the San Fer­nan­do First Court. Ra­jack is ac­cused of mur­der­ing Williams and her son on a date un­known be­tween Ju­ly 17 and Ju­ly 21, 2010 at Ste Madeleine. Ra­jack's at­tor­ney, Ja­son Jack­son, said he was yet to re­ceive items of dis­clo­sure which the pros­e­cu­tion promised to de­liv­er to his law of­fice af­ter the first court hear­ing.

Po­lice pros­e­cu­tor Sgt Ku­mar Ram­lochan said Sgt Pe­ter Ramdeen, who laid the charges against Ra­jack, was not present in court and he was not in a po­si­tion to say if dis­clo­sure was ready. He said the case file was sub­mit­ted for trans­mis­sion to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions of­fice. Mc Ken­zie asked if a state at­tor­ney was ap­point­ed. Ram­lochan said none was ap­point­ed and he could not say when the file was sent. Jack­son said he was sup­posed to have re­ceived his client's in­ter­view notes, the death cer­tifi­cates and post-mortem re­ports. On the last oc­ca­sion, he said, he wait­ed for the po­lice to de­liv­er the items to his of­fice but they did not. Ram­lochan said he had no word from Ramdeen and the file was in tran­sit.

"That does not pre­clude any­one from mak­ing dis­clo­sure. In tran­sit means the file is in the hands of a se­nior of­fi­cer," Jack­son said.

Mc Ken­zie agreed that the dis­clo­sure should be avail­able. Ram­lochan sought the in­ter­ven­tion of state at­tor­ney Lisa Singh who said: "When the file goes in­to the DPP's cus­tody the state at­tor­ney (ap­point­ed) has to make a de­ci­sion on what (item) to dis­close to the de­fence." The mag­is­trate said the state "must do what it has to do quick­ly in that re­gard." In the state's de­fence, Singh said, the mat­ter was "fair­ly re­cent." How­ev­er, Mc Ken­zie said: "That's the mind­set, that's the mind­set...it's re­cent. When you say it's re­cent then every­body drags their feet on this." The case was ad­journed to Au­gust 26.