2 Point Fortin men freed of murder charge a second time

TWO Point Fortin men were acquitted on Wednesday for a second time of the 2007 murder of a Servol Life Centre student.

Point Fortin friends Dirk Bruno and Sheldon Henry tasted freedom again after Justice Gail Gonzales found them not guilty.

The judge is yet to give her written verdict.

This was the men’s second trial, which was ordered when the State successfully appealed the first judge’s decision to uphold a no-case submission which secured the men’s freedom in 2015.

At the first trial, St Clair-Douglas held the identification evidence of the main witness, Gabriel Charles, was poor. Charles was killed in 2008 and his depositions were used as evidence against the men at their trial.

The men, both of New Village, Point Fortin, were charged with the murder of Rasheed Goodridge, 21.

They were represented by attorneys Larry Williams, Perusha Lord, Marissa Bubb and Peter Carter.

It was the prosecution’s case that on May 22, 2007, Goodridge and Charles were near a bamboo patch at La Fortune Road, Point Fortin, and were selling marijuana when Goodridge was shot in the head and chest.