A witness yesterday testified in the murder trial of Arnett Gardens FC head coach Sergeant Calvin Lewis that he had lied to investigators when he told them he had witnessed Lewis gun down the deceased at the National Stadium.

He told jurors in the Home Circuit Court that he was coerced to do it by two men in his Arnett Gardens, St Andrew community.

In explaining how he came to lie, the witness said that he was waiting to give his statement about the April 1998 shooting of Hapete Henry, during a football match at the stadium, to the police when two men approached him to say that businessman George Phang wanted to see him.

He said that the two told him to tell investigators that he had witnessed the shooting. At the time, he said, his community was "under order" and there were "some leaders that people had to look up to".

According to the prosecution, the shooting occurred during a match-up between Arnett Gardens FC and Seba United of Montego Bay.

Lewis wasn't part of the football club at the time of the incident.

Yesterday, the witness testified that, on the day in question, he heard an explosion and turned around to see Henry on the ground and Lewis — standing about 39 feet away — holding his own head from which blood was streaming. He said that blood was coming from the region of Henry's belly and that members of the crowd took him up and rushed him to hospital.

The witness told jurors that he never saw Lewis with a gun, but that spectators in the grandstand area of the stadium kept repeating: "Yuh see how yuh shot di yout'."

Meanwhile, Phang was scheduled to testify for the prosecution after the luncheon break, but counsel for the Crown Joan Barnett asked the court for an adjournment until today as the police could not locate him.

Lewis is being represented by Queen's Counsel K Churchill Neita, Delano Harrison, QC, and Junior Counsel Renae Barker.

The trial continues today.