Anna-Lisa Paul
Senior Reporter
ann-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt
As she continued summarising the evidence and legal issues in the Moruga Murder Trial yesterday, High Court Judge Carla Brown-Antoine took the 12-member jury through the post-mortem reports on the three friends who died as a result of gunshot wounds.
The State alleges that Kerron Eccles and Alana Duncan survived the volley of gunshots allegedly unleashed on the car they were travelling in at the corner of Rochard Douglas Road and Gunness Trace, Barrackpore, on July 22, 2011, while Abigail Johnson died at the scene.
According to the evidence of forensic pathologist Dr Estlyn McDonald-Burris, Johnson died of multiple gunshot wounds to the upper body. She suffered gunshot injuries to her forehead, face, neck and chest, with shrapnel injuries to her arm.
Duncan had injuries to her elbow, leg, and chest, while one of her lungs collapsed. Eccles, who sustained injuries mainly along the right side of the body, was injured in the chest, arm and hip.
The judge also took the jurors through the certificates of analysis of the lead pellets and bullet fragments found in the bodies of the three victims which were matched against the firearms used by the officers.
They were reminded that while it could not be ascertained if the lead pellets recovered from Johnson and Eccles’s bodies were fired from one of the Galils assigned to the police officers, a jacketed bullet fragment from a nine millimetre pistol was fired from one of the TTPS-issued guns.
Brown-Antoine also reviewed the evidence gathered by crime-scene investigators from the gravel road leading off the M2 Ring Road, Woodland, where it was alleged that Duncan and Eccles were taken by the officers and executed after they survived the first shooting in Barrackpore.
It was alleged that at that location, police recovered a live round of ammunition, a latex glove and several bullet casings which were matched to the weapons issued to the police officers. In addition, swabs of blood found in the B15 and two police vehicles were matched to the victims.
On Wednesday, the jury was reminded of the evidence provided by hostile witness WPC Nicole Clement at the preliminary inquiry, in which she claimed that she along three of her colleagues took Eccles and Duncan to a remote road off the M2 Ring Road, Woodland, where they were shot before all three were taken to Princes Town Health Facility.
In that account which was read into evidence, Clement detailed the steps she and her colleagues allegedly took to cover up the crime, including rehearsing their version of the events and writing consistent statements.
The jury also heard that months before she was due to testify, Clement sent a letter to Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard, SC, indicating her reluctance to testify.
Clement also provided a statement in which she gave an alternate version of the events and claimed she threatened her colleagues to execute Eccles and Duncan after the initial shooting.
The judge advised the jury to approach Clement’s evidence with special care and caution as they had to determine whether she had a motive to lie about her former co-workers. She also advised them not to draw conclusions about the accused officers based on the reasons Clement gave for refusing to testify in the trial.
The judge also presented the jury with a synopsis of the evidence by other police officers about their role in the investigation and their views on the officers’ professional reputations.
Sgt Khemraj Sahadeo and PCs Renaldo Reviero, Glenn Singh, Roger Nicholas, Safraz Juman, and Antonio Ramadin are being represented by Israel Khan, SC, Ulric Skerritt and Arissa Maharaj.
The prosecution is led by Gilbert Peterson, SC, Elaine Greene, Giselle Ferguson-Heller and Katiesha Ambrose-Persadsingh.
Justice Brown-Antoine will continue her summation when the trial resumes today.