A 30-year-old Port-of-Spain man is ex­pect­ed to ap­pear be­fore a Mas­ter of the High Court, charged with a 2023 dou­ble mur­der.

A re­lease from the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) said Adri­an Roberts of Tilbury Place, East Dry Riv­er, was al­so charged with shoot­ing with in­tent, pos­ses­sion of firearm and pos­ses­sion of am­mu­ni­tion, in con­nec­tion with an in­ci­dent which led to the deaths of Franz Lavine and Joseph Lawrence and the wound­ing of an­oth­er man.

Lavine, 51, of Diego Mar­tin and Lawrence, 45, of St. Ann’s were found with gun­shot wounds along the road­way in the St. Ann’s dis­trict on No­vem­ber 11 2023.

Lavine died at the scene, while Lawrence was pro­nounced dead at the hos­pi­tal. A third vic­tim who suf­fered gun­shot wounds to the leg and had to seek med­ical at­ten­tion.

In the state­ment, the TTPS said "The vic­tims were at a bar when two armed men opened fire on the group and then fled the scene."

A male sus­pect was ar­rest­ed by of­fi­cers of the Homi­cide Bu­reau of In­ves­ti­ga­tions (HBI), Re­gion One, on No­vem­ber 13 2023 and placed un­der po­lice guard at the hos­pi­tal.

He was then re­leased based on ad­vice from Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions, Roger Gas­pard on Wednes­day 27 De­cem­ber 2023, pend­ing fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions.

The man was re-ar­rest­ed on No­vem­ber 4 2024 and the DPP ad­vised that charges be laid against him on No­vem­ber 6.