Officers recalled for questioning

RETIRED Senior Supt Johnny Abraham and former police photographer Arlene Skerritt-Marshall were today recalled for further questioning on inconsistencies in their evidence by defence attorneys for two of the five men on trial for the 2005 murder of businessman Dr Eddie Koury.

Abraham was asked about a pair of brown Clarks allegedly worn by accused Jerome Murray and of an interview with accused Terry Moore.

Questioned by Moore’s attorney Mario Merritt, the policeman, who said he was one of several officers involved in the Koury investigation, said at the time of interviewing Moore he did not know about a 2004 judges’ rule which directs police officers to have a suspect sign any oral utterance they give.

According to Merritt, Abraham did so for another accused, but the policeman said when Murray made the oral utterance, he did not consider it an interview.

Abraham also said he did not get an opportunity to ask Moore any question since as soon as he was cautioned, he blurted out something and the “interview” came to an end.

“I don’t know why the interview was stopped,” he said, adding that former WPC Megan Francis-Brooks conducted the interview and he did not ask her why it came to an end.

Francis-Brooks, in her evidence earlier this week, said after she cautioned Moore, she recorded Moore’s utterance in the station diary.

Abraham said the utterance “wasn’t a confession.”

Skerritt-Marshall was asked about a photograph she said she took of a grey, black and white pair of sneakers, allegedly belonging to Moore.

In her evidence at the trial, Skerritt-Marshall said that photograph was not produced in the bundle of photographs admitted into evidence because it was over-exposed.

However, it was put to her by Merritt that during her evidence at the magistrates’ court, she said she did not take a photograph of the shoes because she was not instructed to do so by the fingerprint expert at the house at La Resource, D’Abadie, where Moore and several others were arrested.

She admitted that she would have taken instructions to take photographs of items with evidential value, including blood, and if there was nothing she would not be required to take a photograph of it.

Skerritt-Marshall also admitted that at the time, police crime scene experts, including herself, wore scrubs and while she could not recall if everyone at the house wore them, she knew she did and so too the fingerprint expert.

She also said she took photographs of bullet projectiles at the compound of ISKO Enterprises Ltd, in Macoya, and was asked by Merritt why didn’t she take close-ups of the items.

Koury, the managing director of ISKO Enterprises, an import and distribution company, was abducted from his office on September 21, 2005. Two days later, his headless corpse was found in central Trinidad. His head has never been found.

On trial before Justice Malcolm Holdip in the Port of Spain First Criminal Court, at the Hall of Justice, Port of Spain, are Shawn James, Caleb Donaldson, Murray, Moore and Robert Franklyn.

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