A neighbour of Constable Noel Maitland testified on Tuesday that he did not cause footage from a closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera system at his Chelsea Manor apartment in St Andrew to be erased in 2022.

The neighbour is the sixth witness to give evidence in the murder trial of Maitland in the Home Circuit Court in downtown Kingston. Maitland is charged with murder and preventing the lawful burial of a corpse following the disappearance of his 24-year-old girlfriend, Donna-Lee Donaldson, in July 2020.

Donaldson was last seen at the Chelsea Manor apartment complex. Based on circumstantial evidence, including blood found on curtains, prosecutors theorise that she was killed between July 12 and 13, 2022 inside Maitland’s apartment.

They also believe that her body was unlawfully disposed of thereafter.

CCTV footage was said to have captured when Donaldson arrived at the apartment, but none showed when she left.

On Monday, during the trial, the neighbour admitted that CCTV footage was only stored for five days before it was deleted automatically. He said he did not know that was how the system worked and that he only learned of this when investigators from the Independent Commission of Investigations came to his apartment for the camera system to help gather evidence in the case.

During cross-examination by attorney-at-law Christopher Townsend on Tuesday, the neighbour was asked if he had erased camera footage.

“No, I did not erase the footage,” the witness replied.

Townsend asked him whether he did anything that caused the footage to be erased.

“No, I did not,” the witness answered.

During re-examination conducted by prosecutor Claudette Thompson, the witness was asked if he recalled telling the court previously that he had checked the cameras to see if they were properly functioning.

The witness said, “Yes”.

Thompson then sought to find out whether he had checked to determine if the cameras were actually recording.

“I would not have checked to see if the recording function was working properly,” he answered.

Thompson then asked the witness if he knew how to check if the recording function was working properly.

“No, I didn’t know how to check,” he stated.

In continuing her probe, Thompson said, “You told this court that Mr Maitland told you he wanted to see footage because someone had gone missing.”

Thompson asked why he had not called the police, especially after claiming that he felt pressured by Maitland, who had allegedly asked him repeatedly if he could delete the footage after viewing it in the neighbour’s apartment.

The witness said he did not have any information at the time regarding the case or a missing person and that he never saw anything incriminating on the footage that would have prompted him to call the police.

“At that point I had not seen anything online, so I did not have that context,” he explained.

He said it wasn’t until he saw certain things on the Internet and after receiving a call from his mother that he began to suspect something was not right.

The trial continues today.