THE defence team for alleged Klansman faction leader Tesha Miller and his co-accused Kirk Forrester was on Monday disarmed after their attempts to brand a detective, who probed a double murder and wounding with intent case, as a liar was countered by the prosecution through his own notes.

The detective sergeant who initially led the investigations into the shooting in Bog Walk St Catherine which left two men dead and another nursing wounds was the latest witness to take the stand in the ongoing trial of 25 suspected members of the Tesha Miller faction of the Klansman gang now underway in the Home Circuit Division of the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston before Justice Dale Palmer.

The shooting incident is the substance of Counts nine, 10 and 11 on the 32 count indictment produced by the Crown. Count nine charges Miller and Forrester with “facilitating the commission of a serious offence by a criminal organization” — the February 24, 2018 murder of Leon Burke in St Catherine. Meanwhile, count 10 further charges Miller and Forrester with facilitating the commission of a serious offence by a criminal organisation, the murder of Kemar Williams. Count 11 further charges them with knowingly facilitating the commission of a serious offence by a criminal organisation, the wounding with intent of (name withheld).

In giving his evidence, the cop had told the court that the day following the incident, based on information he received, he returned to the crime scene and went to the rear of the building where he discovered a black plastic bag containing a Taurus 9 mm handgun which he later examined and turned over to the government forensic lab for analysis. While being led through his evidence by an acting deputy director of public prosecutions, the cop was able to recite from memory the serial number of the mystery firearm and other details before that weapon, the magazine and three rounds were tendered and admitted into evidence as exhibits after being identified.

However in cross-examining the cop, defence attorneys accused him of being deliberately selective in his recall. Attorney Kemar Robinson, who represents Forrester, was first to confront the lawman about his ability to quote the serial number of the recovered firearm from memory in giving his evidence in court while struggling to recall if he had definitively stated that the gun was used in the incident. He accused him of attempting to mislead the court.

The cop had told Robinson that “based on information” he received while probing the murders, he had said in his first statement that “it could have been” that the firearm was used in the incident. After being shown that statement where he definitively said “the recovered weapon was one of the weapons used” the lawman said, “I stated it based on information received”.

“When you stated that, were you speaking the truth?” Robinson pressed.

“From information received I was speaking the truth,” the cop replied, before going on to add that he had mentioned the detail in his second statement.

“I am going to suggest to you that it wasn’t in your second statement,” Robinson persisted.

“Okay, if it’s not there, it’s not there,” the cop said.

The cop in explaining why his first reference to the serial number of the firearm was only in a second statement which he wrote this month – eight years after the incident — said he had been transferred shortly after producing the first statement. He told the court that he was contacted only last week about giving evidence this week and said in reading over his first statement he realised there were details that he had noted during the course of his investigations that had not been put in the first statement. He said those details, such as the serial number, were contained in his notebook; hence the seemingly new details in his second statement.

On Monday, attorney Mark Reid who is representing Miller John continuing where Robinson left off.

“There is no serial number recorded in your notebook,” the attorney stated.

“I disagree with you… matter of a fact, I had the serial number written down and I took a picture of it,” the sleuth countered.

“I am going to suggest that you are lying to this court,” Reid asserted.

“I am not,” the cop retorted.

During re-examination, the Crown had the witness produce his notebook and locate the notation which was in dispute before seeking the court’s permission to extract the reference to the serial number so it could be tendered and admitted into evidence, effectively quashing the dispute over his truthfulness.

In providing the background to his probe, the detective sergeant said he was on duty on the night of February 24, 2018 at the Linstead Police Station when, about 10:40 pm, he was alerted to an incident on Bog Walk Main Road in the vicinity of Pineapple Lane.

The cop said in arriving at the location he saw a male lying on his left side inside a container, which housed a bar and cook shop, with what appeared to be blood coming from “the region of his head and face”. He said he saw what appeared to be about three spent shells beside the body.

The cop said upon entering the bar itself he saw several other spent casings before the bar counter and on top. He told the court that in going beyond the counter he encountered another male lying on his right side with what appeared to be blood coming from beneath him. The lawman said this man, who was known to him, was the owner and proprietor of the business: Leon Burke, otherwise called “Lenky”.

He said scene of crime personnel who were called processed the scene and collected and packaged evidence while funeral home workers removed the bodies to Spanish Town Hospital.

The cop said during the course of his investigations he visited the Spanish Town Hospital where he was directed to a cubicle in the Accident and Emergency Department where he saw a doctor tending a male who had what appeared to be gunshot wounds to the belly, thigh and hip. The cop said he, however, refrained from taking a statement from the 49-year-old-man (name being withheld) “because of the condition he was in at the time” and made arrangements to do so at a later date.

He said the day after the shooting incident, based on information he received, he returned to the crime scene and went to the rear of the building where he discovered a black plastic bag containing the Taurus 9 mm handgun which he later examined and turned over to the government forensic lab for analysis.

That firearm along with the magazine and three rounds were tendered and admitted into evidence as exhibits after they were identified by the investigating officer on Monday. The cop said he later attended the post-mortem exercises where relatives of the dead men identified their bodies. The lawman, who said he was transferred from that location in 2019, said up to the time the matter was reassigned he had arrested no one in relation to the incident and also had no suspects.

The matter resumes on Tuesday morning at 10 o’clock.