DEREK ACHONG

Se­nior Re­porter

derek.achong@guardian.co.tt

Po­lice have ad­mit­ted that there is lit­tle to no di­rect ev­i­dence link­ing An­drew and Alana Mathu­ra to the al­leged mur­der of their teenage daugh­ter Han­nah.

Po­lice pros­e­cu­tor In­spec­tor Ash­ley Mon­groo made the rev­e­la­tion dur­ing the cou­ple’s first court ap­pear­ance be­fore High Court Mas­ter Sarah De Sil­va, yes­ter­day morn­ing.

Mon­groo claimed that homi­cide de­tec­tives were re­ly­ing on the ev­i­dence of 26 wit­ness­es, post-mortem and DNA analy­sis re­ports, and fab­ric in­clud­ing a sheet that her re­mains were al­leged­ly found wrapped in.

He claimed that they were al­so re­ly­ing on two state­ments from Alana and one from An­drew that were record­ed while they were be­ing in­ter­ro­gat­ed by de­tec­tives.

“It (the case) is based on ut­ter­ances made by the ac­cused and oth­er wit­ness­es. It is most­ly cir­cum­stan­tial ev­i­dence,” Mon­groo said.

An­drew, 66, and Alana, 63, both of Bu­tu Road, Val­sayn, are ac­cused of mur­der­ing their 18-year-old daugh­ter on an un­known date be­tween Ju­ly 8, 2017, when she was last seen alive, and March 13, this year, a day af­ter her skele­tal re­mains were un­earthed in the back­yard of the fam­i­ly’s home.

The cou­ple, who made their vir­tu­al court ap­pear­ance from a hold­ing cell at the Tu­na­puna Po­lice Sta­tion, was not called up­on to plead to the charge.

Sit­ting next to each oth­er, Alana was sto­ic while her hus­band ap­peared more an­i­mat­ed as he got up to in­form Mas­ter De Sil­va that he was not hear­ing her via video con­fer­enc­ing. He even briefly smirked while ad­dress­ing the court.

While Mas­ter De Sil­va re­mand­ed the cou­ple, she ad­vised them of their right to ap­ply to a judge for bail.

“Bail for this of­fence is on­ly grant­ed in ex­cep­tion­al cir­cum­stances,” De Sil­va said.

She al­so not­ed that if their lawyers file the bail ap­pli­ca­tion this week, it could be heard by a judge, next Fri­day.

Dur­ing the hear­ing, Mas­ter De Sil­va set dates for pros­e­cu­tors and de­fence at­tor­neys to do their fil­ings in the mat­ter.

She is ex­pect­ed to pre­side over the duo’s suf­fi­cien­cy hear­ing on April 1, 2026.

Po­lice found the skele­tal re­mains when they ex­ca­vat­ed the yard at the fam­i­ly’s home af­ter re­port­ed­ly re­ceiv­ing a tip-off from a rel­a­tive in March. The cou­ple was ques­tioned by po­lice but was re­leased pend­ing fur­ther in­ves­ti­ga­tions. They were re­ar­rest­ed and charged on Wednes­day af­ter in­ves­ti­ga­tors con­sult­ed with the Of­fice of the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions (DPP).

Han­nah’s fa­ther was rep­re­sent­ed by Tahi­rah Gib­son-Sobers, while Stef­fon Boodooram rep­re­sent­ed the moth­er.