Accused: Crying noises was normal

Marlon King said he was not concerned that his four-year-old stepdaughter, Amy Emily Annamunthodo, was making “crying noises” on the day she died since “it was a normal thing.” King, 39, who is before Justice Anthony Carmona charged with beating the child to death, on Monday claimed it was Amy’s mother, Anita, who would beat her. In cross-examination by State attorney Maureceia Joseph in the San Fernando First Assizes, King admitted he did not tell the police that Andre Anthony Rocke was at his home on May 15, 2006, the day Amy died. Rocke allegedly peeped through a hole and saw King punching the child 20 to 30 times while she hung from her hair in the house.

King said when he left his Ste Madeleine, Marabella, home to buy cigarettes for himself and Rocke, Amy was sitting next to Rocke in his living room. Asked where was Amy when he came back, he said: “When I came back I glimpse at her. She was making a ‘lil’ noise, not crying to make plenty noise. She was humming and playing with her hands on the bed.” King mimicked the humming sound the child made. Asked if he was concerned by that, he said: “No ma’am. I saw it on more than one occasion like when her mother beat her she would lie on the bed and hum.” He further said before he left her with Rocke she was making a crying noise. “That was a normal thing,” he added.

When Anita returned home, he said, they all ate a meal of boiled eggs and potatoes and he left around 6 pm. “Amy was on the couch with her mother alive and playing,” he said. About an hour and 15 minutes while he was by a neighbour, he said Anita called him. “She tell me come fast like something happen to Amy.”  He said when he got home Amy was in the backroom and Anita was hugging her. He said: “She (Amy) was not moving or crying.” He said he stood in shock. He said Anita told him “she stop and stretch out” and “like she dead.”

Rocke said King was his brethren but King said he was more his neighbour than a friend. However, King said, he would sometimes cook for Rocke’s children, give him advice and allow him to watch television and wash his clothes by him. King admitted he did not tell the police he had an arrangement with his employers, a security firm, to keep guard dogs under his house during the day. He also admitted it was untrue when he told the police he was on the way to a neighbour’s house when Anita called him. The matter continues today.