TAXIMAN Wayne Wright, the main witness in the X-6 murder trial, yesterday spent almost the entire morning on the witness stand denying information he had allegedly given to the police in relation to the shooting death of Khajeel Mais.

This included details that he had seen the shooter with a gun and that he knew him as ‘Nigga’.

“Didn’t you tell the police that Nigga was the man who came out of the BMW X6… ,” Prosecutor Jeremy Taylor asked.

“No,” Wright shouted out.

“Didn’t you say that he also had a gun in his hand?” Taylor further asked.

“No,” Wright again answered.

Wright, in his testimony, which was continuing from Thursday and was again full of contradictions and maintained his testy demeanour which included rolling his eyes and shaking his feet, also denied telling the police that he had known Nigga for eight years and that he knew that Nigga drives a dark blue BMW X6.

Wright was also asked about Mais whom he testified that he had never met before the day he took his taxi.

“Did you ever say I have known Khajeel from he was a young boy, he is from Crane Avenue and he is now 17. He attend Kingston College?” the prosecutor asked

“Who say that, me?” The witness asked in a surprised tone.

“No, I never say nothing, never,” he added.

“Didn’t you tell Officer Hines that Khajeel was attending KC,” Taylor questioned.

“No! I couldn’t know him school, I couldn’t know that, all a dem deh is put up by unuh,” he said.

But he later admitted that he told the police that Khajeel was about 16 or 17 and that he told them that he was from Crane Avenue.

Wright also denied that he told the police in his statement that he had seen the vehicle that he hit and that it was more blue than black and that it had on a BMW logo.

The witness, during his first day on the stand, had testified that he did not see the vehicle that he had collided with and that he did not have time to take notice as shots started firing right after the collision and he had not seen anyone on the road.

Wright had also testified that on the night of the incident it was raining and the area was foggy.

But, on that same day he had also testified that he had told the police in his statement that he was sure that the car that he hit was black and that it was an SUV type or an X5 or a “big back” vehicle.

Wright, who shortly after the trial resumed yesterday was adjudged a hostile witness by the prosecution, after permission was granted by Justice Lloyd Hibbert to treat him as such because he showed himself to be inconsistent and adverse, grudgingly admitted that he gave the police two statements after initially insisting that he had only given one statement.

However, he testified that the police tried to influence him to lie about the vehicle.

“Mr Thompson show me a vehicle at Constant Spring Police Station and tell me say ‘go over there and tell dem a dat yu lick’, and me said mi nah do dat and a him a show mi the man,” Wright claimed during his testimony.

He also testified that when he was giving the second statement the police officer had stopped taking the statement after he had got a phone call and had ripped up the statement and threw it into a small bin and that the police then took him to the murder scene and then took him home.

Following that he said one Inspector Thompson came for him and took him back to the station.

According to Wright, that was the officer who had told him to lie about the car and also about the man called Nigga.

“I didn’t tell him nothing. A him show me a driver’s licence and say ‘dis a de man him name Nigga, him tall, him about six foot, mi waa yu help me wid him, a long time mi want get him’,” Wright said.

The prosecutor then asked: “Didn’t you say to Inspector Thompson ‘the only reason I have to say that is Nigga fire the gun is because is only Nigga mi see firing at my taxi?’”

But Wright strongly denied this. “No! No! They were begging me to do that, I told them no I am telling the truth,” he insisted.

He was further asked if he did not tell the police in his statement that Nigga was of thick built, brown complexion, black hair and that he had a “high-up” bottom.

“No. Mr Thompson told me all of those,” Wright answered.

The witness was also questioned about what he had allegedly written in his statement about incident leading up to the death of Mais.

Wright also denied telling the police that on the night in question he had driven behind a dark coloured BMW X6 “more black than blue” from Havendale Drive on Highland Drive and was about two feet behind the vehicle. He also denied telling the police that the reason he was so close was that he wanted to overtake the vehicle.

“Did you tell the police ‘I tried to get around but he was in the middle of the road?’” Taylor asked.

“I tell him I was going around and it touch,” Wright replied.

The prosecutor them asked him if when he had earlier testified that he had bumped into a vehicle out of nowhere and ‘the touch’ that he just mentioned if they are not two different things and he disagreed.

“You are trying to make it into two different things. You a make statement for me to talk and I am not doing it,” Wright told the prosecutor.

Businessman Patrick Powell is being tried for the shooting death of Mais, who was reportedly travelling in a taxi, which collided with a BMW X6 motor vehicle.

It is alleged that the driver of the BMW got out and fired at the taxi, hitting the boy.

Powell is also charged with shooting at taxi driver Wayne Wright with intent to cause harm.

The trial ended early yesterday after the lead prosecutor made an application for the matter to break until Monday in order for the prosecution team to have discussions on how they will be dealing with the rest of the case.