On trial for murder: Senior Superintendent Reneto Adams, Sergeant Roderick Collier, Corporal Leford Gordon, Constable Patrick Coke, Constable Devon Bernard, and Constable Shane Lyons.

The victims: Lewina Thompson, Angella Richards, Kirk Gordon, and Matthew James.

The defence lawyers: K Churchill Neita, Jacqueline Samuels-Brown and Christine Hudson; Valerie Neita-Robertson and Gladstone Wilson; Earl Witter and Errol Gentles; Oswest Senior-Smith and Althea McBean; Deborah Martin; and Robert Fletcher.

The prosecutors: DPP Kent Pantry, acting senior deputy DPP David Fraser, acting deputy DPP Donald Bryan, acting crown counsel Chester Crooks, and Terrence Williams, DPP of the British Virgin Islands.

The judge: Chief Justice Lensley Wolfe.

Monday:

Exuding displeasure, chief justice Lensley Wolfe again raps the media, this time for its headlines as well as what he said was the inaccurate use of the word ‘bugging’ in a Saturday Observer headline on a story of deputy commissioner Mark Shield’s testimony, where the police crime chief told the court he had attached a recording device to Reneto Adams’ phone after Adams refused to speak to Crawle investigators.

He also chides the Gleaner for misrepresenting testimony about a British judge’s reprimand of Shields, a near 30-year veteran of the London Metropolitan police, for his conduct in a UK case.

Wolfe threatens to bar reporters from covering the trial if inaccuracies persist.

The chief justice is also upset by the timing of a story broken by the Sunday Observer that government is paying $19 million in legal aid to the cops on trial, $9 million of which goes to Adams who is represented by three attorneys, including top gun K Churchill Neita, QC.

Government forensic analyst Daniel Wray, a retired assistant commissioner of police, testifies that the Winchester rifle found in the house at Crawle had been fired on or around the day of the murders; that he saw 10 bullet holes of 5.56mm size indicating firing from outside into the house, and two bullet holes, made by 7.62mm cartridges, indicating firing from inside a room to the outside.

The bullets may have been fired from an M16 rifle, Wray testifies.

Tuesday:

A British forensic expert testifies that some of the Crawle victims were shot at relatively close range and that he found gunpowder residue on the clothing of the deceased, where previous witness Daniel Wray had found none.

But Robin Keely, a senior forensic analyst with the London Metropolitan police said he used a stronger, more sensitive microscope which magnifies images to 500,000 times their size.

Wray testifies under re-examination that his microscope can magnify only up to 10 times actual size.

In cross-examination following on his testimony Monday, Wray tells the court that the tests he did on expended cartridge fragments found that 14 had been fired from an M16 rifle with serial number A0045113.

Three of the 7.62mm cartridges were also from the Winchester rifle that the police said they found at the scene, Wray tells the court.

A cop, constable Tyrone Brown, had testified in week three of the trial that a gun was collected in Kingston by the police, fired twice along the route to Crawle, and was then placed at the death scene by Adams.

Wednesday:

East Kingston businessman Danhai Williams’ name emerges again during testimony for a second time since the trial began. But Wolfe puts the reigns on the testimony of SSP Donald Pusey of smatterings of a cellphone conversation he overheard, including Williams’ use of the word ‘Taurus’, during a visit by the businessman to his Ruthven Road office, home of the Special Anti-Crime Task Force (SACTF).

Defence lawyers object to the line of questioning, and after lengthy submissions outside of the hearing of witnesses and jurors, Wolfe rules for the defence.

Williams’ name had initially surfaced during testimony by constable Brown who said he knew Williams during his evidence that a group of policemen, himself among them, had travelled to premises at East Kingston and collected a firearm that he later saw Adams planting at the murder scene.

Pusey testifies that the police bus used in the Crawle operation was assigned to his unit and used in undercover operations to spy on gang members, but that its use to transport Adams and his team to Clarendon was done without his overt consent; that he knew the bus was used after Sergeant Que Facey told him its cover was blown because of the Crawle events.

He had initially told Facey he would not release the bus for him to go with Adams, Pusey said on cross-examination, saying that Adams, as a matter of principle, ought to have made the request directly of him as head of the SACTF.

Pusey denies he is jealous of Adams, whose Crime Management Unit had eclipsed his in popularity. He also denies suggestions that he had previously turned down three requests for assistance with operations at Crawle to go after wanted man Bashington ‘Chen Chen’ Douglas.

Thursday:

There were reports outside the courtroom that prosecution witness Danhai Williams could not be found to be served with a subpoena for his testimony.

Another court at Half-Way-Tree trying a case in which Williams is answering to fraud charges, issued an arrest warrant for the businessman, whom, it emerged, has been flouting the conditions of his bail in that case.

Back in the Home Circuit Court downtown, Chief Justice Wolfe cuts short the testimony of telecoms expert Howard Mais about a mobile phone number, on objections by the defence that the prosecution had not laid sufficient grounds for the testimony.

The prosecution argued that Mais’ testimony would become relevant based on other evidence to come before the court, but Wolfe agreed with the defence, scolding the crown in the process about the proper lining up of witnesses.

Mais and two other witnesses scheduled for similar testimony were bound over to return to court Monday.

Policewoman Lorraine Granston testifies that on the instruction of Adams, she signs the firearm register as the person issuing an M16 rifle serial number A0044726 to Constable Shane Lyons, co-accused, though she had not issued the gun to him.

Indications are that Lyons has had the gun since October 2002.

Wray had testified last week that bullet fragments found at the scene matched the M16 rifle recorded as issued to Lyons.

Friday:

Wolfe warns defence and prosecution lawyers that he intends to wrap up the trial by the close of the circuit session on December 16, as it became apparent that the trial would likely overrun its six-week duration.

Failure to organise themselves, he tells members of the bar, would result in sanctions.

The prosecution announces that it will be dropping eight of the 46 witnesses it had on its original list, including two policemen.