DEFENCE attorneys for eight men accused of being members of the vicious Westmoreland-based King Valley gang will this morning begin making no-case submissions in the bench trial, which is being presided over by Chief Justice Bryan Sykes.

This after the prosecution yesterday closed its case, indicating that it “did not intend to call any other witnesses for the Crown”.

Originally, Justice Sykes had directed that the prosecution “set out, in writing, the case against each defendant in respect of each count” and hand it to defence counsel, intending to begin hearing the no-case submissions on Friday morning.

“The purpose of it is that it brings better focus to the no-case submissions,” the learned trial judge indicated.

However, Oneil Brown, defence counsel for accused Derval Williams, stated his disagreement with the opinion of the chief justice, arguing that having the Crown say where they were going or not “would not yield much fruit”.

Justice Sykes noted that this had been done before and proved successful. Brown, yielding, said he had only done so because he was “outnumbered”.

Defence and prosecution lawyers, at that point, made a plea for more preparation time.

Justice Sykes, however, pointed out that were the matter a trial by jury, those submissions would have had to begin the same afternoon.

“If this were a jury trial it would be beginning now, not because it is a bench trial,” he said.

He then suggested that the court resume sitting this afternoon, with the prosecution outlining the evidence in its case at that time.

Further protestations and defence lawyer Brown interjecting, “then why not begin tomorrow morning at 10:00 am?” saw the chief justice making an about-turn that landed the defence in the hot seat, to their chagrin.

“No-case submissions beginning tomorrow at 10:00 am with the first defendant,” Justice Sykes said in a tone that brooked no further argument.

All eight defence attorneys had earlier indicated that they would be making no-case submissions on behalf of their clients in the matter. The decision by Justice Sykes will now see them proceeding without the guiding document from the Crown.

Eight men: Carlington Godfrey, alias Tommy; Rannaldo McKennis, otherwise known as Ratty; Derval Williams, also called Lukie; Hopeton Sankey, alias Bigga; Christon Grant, alias Ecoy; Lindell Powell also called Lazarus; Copeland Sankey, also known as Tupac; and Sean Suckra, also called Elder, have been on trial before the Home Circuit Court in downtown Kingston since January 14. The men are charged in an indictment containing 11 counts on suspicion of being part of a criminal organisation, providing benefits to a criminal organisation, and conspiring to commit murder, rape and robbery with aggravation from as early as 2013.

In the meantime, prosecutors yesterday made further applications for amendments to two counts on the indictment, and sought to add an additional count. Only one application was granted yesterday.

Earlier this month, prosecutors successfully applied for a further amendment to the 11-count indictment to include rape among the various offences. Despite the protests of defence attorneys, count nine of the indictment was amended to state “rape” instead of “indecent assault”, based on concerns raised during the trial following on the testimony of the star witness.

Additionally, the Crown also made an application to have counts seven, eight and nine of the indictment amended to specifically reflect the locations at which the offences were alleged to have occurred by the stated defendants. The accused were repleaded accordingly.