A delivery truck driver, who was hired by Constable Noel Maitland in July 2022 to transport a settee from his Chelsea Manor apartment to a car wash on Lyndhurst Road in St Andrew, claimed Wednesday that the policeman started giving him an attitude because he felt the driver was trying to avoid him.

The driver is the latest witness to take the stand in Maitland’s murder trial in the Home Circuit Court in downtown Kingston.

Maitland is being tried for murder and preventing the lawful burial of a corpse in relation to the July 12, 2022 disappearance of his 24-year-old social media influencer and entrepreneur girlfriend, Donna-Lee Donaldson. Donaldson was last seen at the Chelsea Manor apartment complex where Maitland lived.

A host of circumstantial evidence led detectives to believe that Donaldson was murdered.

Giving evidence, the driver also told the court that he recorded phone conversations he had with Maitland.

He said he was at Phil’s Hardware on Constant Spring Road in St Andrew when he was beckoned to by a truck sideman he knew as Carlos, with whom he worked. He said that when he walked over to Carlos, he was introduced to Maitland who was sitting in his “hype” motor vehicle. He said another man was sitting in the front passenger seat beside Maitland.

The witness said Maitland told him that he needed a settee to be removed from his apartment and taken to another location. After discussing how much the job would cost, the driver said Maitland told him to drive behind him. According to him, the destination was the Chelsea Manor Apartments. He said the settee was removed from a second floor apartment by Maitland and his friend who was sitting beside him in the car earlier. Maitland and the friend were said to have passed the settee to the driver and Carlos who were on the ground floor near to where the truck was parked.

After he dropped off the settee at a car wash and was paid $5,000, the witness said he and Carlos got back in the truck and left. He was asked by senior prosecutor, Claudette Thompson, whether he had spoken to Maitland again after that occasion.

The driver said yes.

He explained that Maitland called his cell phone around four times. He said no substantial communication occurred on the first two calls. The witness said, however, that during the third or fourth call, he used another cell phone to record the conversation he had with Maitland.

“The last call, Noel called me in a little more attitude. Like him woulda seh, ‘mi a talk to you and you nuh waa talk to mi, a wah? Like dem get to you already’. Him seh him nuh business who deh beside me. Him seh him a try talk to me and mi a try avoid him, like mi naa give him the time of the moment. Den him turn to me and seh, ‘a your second mi see and him seh dem tek weh your truck and mi just a call fi see why dem tek weh your truck’.

“My reply was, ‘a di same thing me want to know. Pure police just come’. He said, ‘that’s why mi call you because your second told me that dem tek weh the truck’. Mi seh, ‘mi nuh understand this because mi do a work for you and police just come tek weh mi truck and all mi a ask dem questions dem a seh it is delicate’. I was the last man to know waa gwaan.

“He said ‘the police are just doing their investigation but you don’t have anything to worry about. When dem finish, you will get back the truck’. Mi seh mi have mi siblings to look after and all everybody was saying is that it was okay. I was saying it can’t be okay because mi nuh have my truck,” the witness said

The driver described the settee, explaining that “it was like burgundy with flowers pattern”. The prosecutor asked him about the size of the settee and he said that it “was the long one”. The prosecutor asked him if he saw Maitland again after he took the settee to the carwash and he said he didn’t see him again in person, but on social media.

“Mi start hear a bag a things,” he said.

While he didn’t see him again, he insisted that he spoke to the policeman on the phone.

“One morning my phone rang. I answered the phone. I didn’t know who it was at first so I hung up. I got a call again. It was early in the morning about after 7:00. The second call, I didn’t answer the phone. It ring again and then mi answer it. By then I was still in my bed. Mi never wake up yet because a hard work mi do so mi tired. On the third call, mi answer it to find out if it was one of my boss or somebody.

“The person said ‘a me’, and mi seh ‘me who?’ Then he called his name. Him seh, ‘a me Noel, a me you carry the settee fa’. He asked if mi not going pick it up back at the upholstering place. I said, ‘which upholstery place?’ Him seh, ‘mi nuh think you did ago come tek up back the summ fi mi at the upholstery place’. Mi seh, ‘which upholstery place?’ By then, mi just heng up mi phone.

“I spoke to him later the same day when he called me back. I seh, how mi fi tek up something and dem tek weh mi truck because by then, dem tek weh mi truck. The police officer dem did have my truck already so I was at home about two to three days after I did the removal. They took the truck to a police station. When me and my sister went up there with the police officers, dem seh dem affi keep the truck fi do some investigation,” he explained.

He said Maitland was curious about the reason the police took the truck and told him that he would make some calls to find out what was the motive.

The witness said it took him around two weeks before he got his truck back.

“I got back my truck when I went up to Criminal Investigation Branch headquarters with my sister and asked when I was getting back the truck and why they had it so long and what was the problem. They told me what the problem was. One of them talked to me and I showed them my phone [with the recordings] because certain things never match up to me.

“I was a fool to this thing so being at home I started to analyse certain things. I showed the police the recording of Noel’s voice and me talking on the phone. I made the recording the same morning when he called. I didn’t record the first two calls. When he called the third time I started to record,” he said.

The witness will continue his testimony today.