Police: Japanese pannist Asami Nagakiya's killer is dead

FIVE YEARS after Japanese pannist Asami Nagakiya was strangled to death, police have concluded that a man they killed in 2016 was her killer.

In a media release on Friday police said the Cold Case Unit, after  Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Roger Gaspard  reviewed the evidence on Thursday, was told it confirmed police suspicion that David Allen was the man who killed Nagakiya.

The release said Gaspard “expressed satisfaction that the investigation was thoroughly done” and concluded that all the evidence pointed to Allen.

Allen, 31, of Enterprise, Chaguanas, was killed in a police shoot-out on December 12, 2016, in Woodbrook. Police said he posed as a woman, complete with make-up and tight-fitting clothing then tried to rob Stir Fry King Restaurant and Casino Pei Da Xiu, on Ariapita Avenue, Woodbrook. During the robbery, off-duty police officer Omari Danglade confronted him  and he was killed while trying to escape.

Nagakiya, who played with the Trinidad All Stars Steel Orchestra for  Panorama 2016, was found dead under a tree in the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port of Spain, on Ash Wednesday. She was still in her Carnival costume.

A close male companion of Nagakiya was questioned and released, along with two women and another man. Police said Nagakiya and her male friend had a falling out over which Carnival band to play with on Carnival Monday but that was resolved by Tuesday.

In 2004, Allen, then 18, disguised himself as a vagrant and tried to rob a TSTT technician, Darryn Baksh, as he was leaving 51 Degrees nightclub on Cipriani Boulevard, Port of Spain. There was a struggle and the technician was shot in the stomach and later died at the Port of Spain General Hospital. Allen was charged with murder.

In 2012, Allen pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter. The State accepted his guilty plea and he was sentenced to four years and six months' imprisonment.