Six police officers on trial for murdering three friends from Moruga in 2011 have declined to testify in their own defence.
Sgt Khemraj Sahadeo and PCs Renaldo Reviero, Glenn Singh, Roger Nicholas, Safraz Juman, Antonio Ramadin were called upon by High Court Judge Carla Brown-Antoine to indicate after the State closed its case against them, yesterday morning.
Asked individually, each of the officers stated that they had received advice from their attorneys to remain silent in the case.
However, only Ramadin indicated that he would be calling defence witnesses.
After the process was completed, Cpl Sterling Lee was called into the witness box to testify.
Lee, who is assigned to St Clair Police Station, claimed that earlier this year, WPC Nicole Clement, who was initially charged alongside the officers before being made a State witness, submitted two statements that he delivered to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).
In one statement, which was referred to by the officers’ lawyer Israel Khan, SC, as he sought to question Clement, earlier this week, Clement essentially recanted her previous claims which implicated her former colleagues for the triple murder.
She claimed to be the “mastermind” as she contended that she threatened her colleagues into executing two of the friends, who allegedly survived the initial shooting on the car they were driving in.
In the other statement, Clement indicated that she was no longer willing to testify against her former colleagues as initially agreed under her plea agreement with the DPP’s Office.
Clement completed her participation in the trial on Thursday.
On Monday, she was deemed a hostile witness after she refused to testify due to alleged “safety and security concerns”.
Clement’s testimony during the preliminary inquiry of the case, in which she claimed that two of the friends survived the initial barrage of gunshots on their vehicle but were executed at a second location, was read to the jury.
She was then questioned about her previous testimony by lead prosecutor Gilbert Peterson, SC, and the group’s defence attorneys Israel Khan, SC, and Ulric Skerritt.
The process was more of a monologue than an interrogation as Clement sat silently with her hands crossed in front of her for several hours each day as she declined to answer any of their questions.
In her previous testimony, Clement claimed that hours, before Abigail Johnson, Kerron Eccles, and Alana Duncan were shot and killed on July 22, 2011, one of her colleagues, received instructions to detain Duncan’s common-law husband Shumba James, who was wanted for several murders.
She admitted that she and her colleagues opened fire on the car James was known to have used as it drove past the corner of Rochard Douglas Road and Gunness Trace in Barrackpore.
James, who testified earlier in the trial, narrowly escaped as he opted to travel with two friends in a separate car while the trio followed behind in his.
Clement claimed that Eccles and one of the women survived the initial volley of gunshots.
She claimed that her colleagues took the duo to a dirt track off the M2 Ring Road in Woodland where they were executed.
She admitted that after the shooting, she and her colleagues were placed on seven days’ leave.
She claimed that during the period, she and her colleagues had several clandestine meetings during which they sought to ensure that their individual reports on the shooting were consistent.
During the hearing, yesterday, prosecutors tendered the preliminary inquiry testimony of Andrel Richards, who was in the car with James.
The jury was not informed of the reason why Richards did not attend court to testify.
Prosecutors also tendered the evidence of a scientific officer from the Forensic Science Centre, who was tasked with testing a glove that was recovered by investigators.
The officer claimed that samples taken from the glove were insufficient for DNA testing.
The officers are also represented by Arissa Maharaj. The State is also being represented by Elaine Greene, Giselle Ferguson-Heller and Katiesha Ambrose-Persadsingh.
The trial is set to resume on Tuesday. —DEREK ACHONG
