Eight of the 26 men on trial for alleged Klansman gang crimes may have mistakenly killed and set a St Catherine couple on fire in 2017 while looking for a rival gangster by the name of “Bobo Sparks”, but on Wednesday Chief Justice Bryan Sykes declared that it does not absolve them from punishment.

The Crown, in opening its case on September 20 last year, said that incident — which is reflected in counts seven and eight on the 25-count indictment — was part of the crimes committed between 2015 and 2019 that are attributable to the gang. This act was said to be carried out by the accused Andre “Blackman” Bryan, the alleged gang leader, and co-accused Fabian Johnson, Dylon McLean, Brian Morris, Michael Whitely, Tareek James, and Jahzeel Blake.

Witness Number One — an ex-gang member-turned-Crown-witness — told the court that himself and those men as well as the accused, Joseph McDermott, and another man known as Frazzle (Damian Doyle, now deceased), were together in one of the two groups that were part of the attack. He also gave evidence as to the lighting at the meeting and how long he saw the accused he had named that night.

Bryan and Walker died “huddled together” after they were peppered with bullets and their wooden dwelling burnt to rubble by the thugs.

On Wednesday, the chief justice, who is at the point in the trial where he is delivering verdicts, said, “the interesting thing here is that we don’t know whether this was Bobo Sparks but at the very least, if he was not, it would mean that Witness Number One and his band went to the wrong place, but it doesn’t exonerate them… it does not negate liability. It is not an exonerating feature or circumstance.”

“So in the end, it really doesn’t matter what names they have, the question is ‘did they go over to the place and do what they intended which was to kill, maim, and burn?’ ” he stated.

Witness Number One, who said the macabre planning meeting took place on a night in the work week, said Andre Bryan said he was going to ‘shell dung Fisheries’ and that they were ‘going to look for Bobo Sparks’. He said that night there were guns in the possession of the men, a crate full of bottle bombs, and that he was the designated carrier.

“It is clear that what Witness Number One is saying is that the purpose of this operation was to rid themselves of Bobo Sparks and so, what you have are persons gathered for the purpose of committing a serious offensive. In this case it’s murder and the bottle bombs serve to burn whatever it is they felt needed burning. So what this means is that even before they left to go over to Fisheries, is that this would demonstrate the existence of a criminal organisation and having regard to what he said he saw — which is bottle bombs — it is extremely unlikely that any of those gathered were unaware of the purpose for which they were gathered. The evidence indicated that Mr Bryan was the prime mover in this elimination exercise,” the trial judge stated.

In noting that the evidence of Witness Number One aligned with that of a community member who gave testimony during the trial, he said, “according to the resident, she was in bed around 3:30 am when she heard the community dogs begin to bark, and then heard a gate kicked off. She said she knew it was Jermaine Bryan’s gate since he was the only one apart from her that had a metal gate in the lane. She said she then heard a door kicked off. Witness Number One had made mention of the same details. She said she then heard gunshots. Witness Number One had said Tareek James and himself had kicked off the gate and that shots were fired by Andre Bryan and James,” the trial judge recounted.

Justice Sykes also said he accepted the evidence of the community member who said she saw Frazzle from the light of a lone bulb in the lane where he stood.

“Then she says she saw the fire. The sequence of events outlined by Witness Number One follows the sequence outlined by [this community witness], the gate kicked in, the door, the shots fired, then the bombs being thrown into the house, and then she saw the fire. I conclude that I am sure that Witness Number One and the [community witness] are speaking about the same event. There is no evidence in the case that any other similar event took place in Fisheries that night,” Justice Sykes added.

He said the evidence of the police witnesses who spoke of spent shell casings from different guns and the burnt remains of the two victims as well as their house suggested that the event took place on or around September 9 in New Nursery.

He noted that even though Witness Number One “was inaccurate about who did what, given the nature of what they were going to do and the expressed purpose, it matters not who did what because all went there with the same shared intent and purpose”. Justice Sykes added that the forensic examination established the bodies as male and female.

“I am satisfied that the samples taken to the forensic laboratory were the samples… maybe chain of custody is intact. I am satisfied that the persons were properly identified as Jermaine Bryan and Cedella Walder but even if they were not, the fact is that two human beings, whatever their names are, were killed in that fire. So in the final analysis, it’s not so much the names of the persons but the fact that humans were in the house and they were killed,” the trial judge said.

The matter continues at 10:00 am today at the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston.