The jury yesterday found the remaining four policemen charged with the October 2003 shooting deaths of two elderly residents in Flankers, St James, not guilty of murder in the Home Circuit Court.

“. You are discharged,” Justice Kay Beckford told Special Constable Metro McFarlane and constables Kevin Williams, Kadian Smith and Donald Thomas who all wore a look of relief as the foreman announced the verdict.

The four were also found not guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter in the deaths of taxi driver David Bacchas, 63, and his passenger Cecil Brown, 65.

The jurors – five men and seven women – who deliberated for almost three hours, re-entered the Number One courtroom greeted by teary-eyed and tense-looking supporters of the accused.

The foreman, who usually wore a smile throughout the four-week trial, stood with a stern face as he delivered the verdict. Two female cops, clutching each other’s hands, repeated every utterance of “not guilty”.

Constable Smith’s father, Anthony Smith, told the jurors thanks and saluted them as they filed out of the courtroom, while McFarlane’s small daughter, sporting a pink dress and beaded hair, greeted him as he left court. The freed men hugged just about everybody they could.

“It feels good,” Williams, 27, told the Observer.

When asked for a comment, Anthony Smith said: “Mi too overjoy fi talk now.” He had earlier predicted that the cops would be freed, based on the evidence presented.

Both Bacchas and Brown were gunned down in a pre-dawn police operation headed by former St James crime chief Deputy Superintendent Derrick ‘Cowboy’ Knight on October 25, 2003.

The police initially said Bacchas and Brown, a newspaper vendor, were killed when gunmen fired on a police party and they returned the fire. But after strong community outcry, the police later said the shootings were accidental. However, throughout the trial, defence attorneys insisted that Bacchas and Brown were killed in a shoot-out.

The incident sparked three days of rioting in the troubled community near the tourist resort city of Montego Bay. At the time, minister of national security Dr Peter Phillips and the then commissioner of police Francis Forbes met with the community and apologised for the fatal incident.

Promises were made that Government would offset the funeral costs and that swift justice would be pursued against the police. Forbes had also said that Scotland Yard detectives were asked to help with the probe.

Yesterday, shortly before the jurors retired at 2:37 pm, Bibzie Foster, the sole female cop charged in the killings, but who was freed on lack of evidence last week, wept. A female supporter beside her also wept openly.

“We have presented the Crown’s case vigorously,” said senior deputy director of public prosecution Paula Llewlyn. She thanked the Flankers witnesses who testified in the trial.

The DPP’s office had argued that the policemen fired upon Bacchas’ taxi without provocation and that the five cops were aiding and abetting each other in common design, which resulted in the deaths.