Man accused of shooting taxi driver at party charged with murder
A man was yesterday charged with the murder of taxi driver Osafo Pollard, who was shot in the head while attending a party at East La Penitence just over a week ago.
Leroy Jones, 24, of North East La Penitence, made his appearance before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan in a Georgetown court, where the charge was read to him.
He was not required to plead to the indictable charge, which stated that on February 2nd, at North East La Penitence, he murdered Pollard.
He was subsequently remanded to prison until March 2nd when the matter will be called again.
Police enquiries had revealed that a loud explosion similar to that of a gunshot was heard followed by persons screaming and running and Pollard, 29, was seen lying on the ground with a wound to his head.
He was picked up and taken to the Georgetown Public Hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries at about 12.20 am on February 3rd while undergoing treatment.
A video seen by this newspaper showed Pollard lying on the ground gasping, as persons stood in proximity awaiting the arrival of an ambulance.
Les Charles Critchlow now faces sentencing after being convicted yesterday afternoon for the 2016 murder of his brother-in-law Terrence Adams.
Following hours of deliberations, a jury returned with its unanimous verdict, finding Critchlow guilty of the May 12th, 2016 murder of Adams at Haslington, East Coast Demerara.
Presiding Judge Navindra Singh has, however, deferred the convict’s sentence to March 4th, at 9am pending the presentation of a probation report.
Critchlow was represented by defence attorney Rachael Bakker.
Critchlow had first been on trial for the murder late last year but indicated during the proceedings that he no longer wanted to go through with a trial and instead pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter, accepting that he had unlawfully killed Adams.
His sentence was at that time also deferred to facilitate a probation report.
When the matter was recalled weeks later, however, Critchlow changed his plea to not-guilty as a result of which another trial had to be conducted.
The state’s case had been that on the night in question Critchlow went into Adams’ shop at Haslington and stabbed him in what Prosecutor Tiffini Lyken had described as an “unprovoked and vicious” attack.
The brother of the deceased, Leyland Nelson, who testified, had recalled Adams having a conversation with the
Critchlow earlier on the day in question about money which he (Critchlow) owed to Adams.
Critchlow’s daughter-in-law Shellon Marks and his reputed wife Janice Nelson had both also testified about arguments between the two men and they had corroborated each other’s account of seeing Critchlow leaving the home on the night in question with a knife stashed in the waist of his pants.
Janice had said that given certain remarks Critchlow had made earlier regarding her brother (the deceased), she told Marks to place a call to him (Adams) informing him to be safe, as Critchlow had left the yard with a knife.
In her testimony, Marks had said that she did try to make the call but was unsuccessful as the Digicel network was down at the time.
According to reports, Adams was at his shop when Critchlow visited and an argument ensued.
An eyewitness had related to this newspaper that the two men were arguing about some work that Critchlow was contracted to do at Janice’s residence and which Adams thought was not properly done.
Janice had told the court about this in her testimony.
The eyewitness related that after the argument ensued, Adams related to the man that it was not the place to speak about the issue and told him that they would talk about it in the morning at the job site.
However, the eyewitness had said, “Les din wan hear that and he start to bad up and start telling [the deceased] ’bout wuh he gon do he,” prompting Adams to tell the man to leave his shop.
The aggravated man then pulled a knife from his waist and stabbed Adams in his lower abdomen.
“After he [Adams] get stab, he run about 50 meters and fall down,” the witness related, while stating that after Adams ran away Critchlow raced in the opposite direction.
The cause of Adams’ death had been given as multiple incised wounds.