By LAMECH JOHNSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
ljohnson@tribunemedia.net
CRUCIAL details in the testimony of a key witness to the fatal shooting of businessman Kurt McCartney led a judge to excuse a jury for the day while prosecution and lawyers for the accused held extensive legal discussions in their absence.
Senior Justice Stephen Isaacs ordered the 12-member jury to return to the Supreme Court today at noon. The legal discussions, which stemmed from the prosecution’s approved application to lead further evidence from an anonymous witness, began yesterday.
Prior to the adjournment, the Crown’s anonymous witness was giving testimony about photographs of possible suspects shown to him by police which ultimately led to him identifying Lyndera Curry and Sumya Ingraham in court as the two females he saw with Thorne Edwards and Okell Farrington in Gambier Village the night of October 24, 2013.
Edwards, Farrington, Ingraham and Curry have been in custody since November 2013 awaiting trial concerning the murder and armed robbery of the victim, who is the brother of Democratic National Alliance Leader Branville McCartney.
A fifth person, Terry Delancy, the owner of Virgo Car Rental, was charged with being an accessory after the fact and is on $15,000 bail.
Ian Cargill is representing Delancy while Sonia Timothy represents Curry.
Ingraham, Edwards and Farrington are respectively represented by Romona Farquharson-Seymour, Terrel Butler and Philip Hilton.
At the start of the brief proceedings in the presence of the jury yesterday, prosecutor Roger Thompson asked the witness, identified in court as “AB,” to describe those females.
“One was light brown skin, short hair. The other was dark skin with braided hair,” the witness said.
When asked how he encountered them, “AB” said on the date in question, “I received a phone call from Thorne.”
“He needed a ride, along with some girls to Gambier,” the court heard.
The witness said he left Sandyport and went to Plantol Street where “I saw Thorne and the two females, and Wern (Farrington) was in a trailing vehicle.”
“Where were the females seated?” the prosecutor asked.
“They sat in the back seat,” the witness said.
He was asked if he had any conversation with them.
“They told me my cologne smell all right. I told them thanks,” the witness said.
After a 20-minute drive from Plantol Street to Gambier Village, the witness said the woman got out of the car and followed Edwards who was approaching a man.
The witness said he stayed in his car for ten minutes before going inside the Last Man Standing Bar then returning to the bar’s entrance where he saw the dark skinned woman arguing with a man.
The witness said the arguing woman then signalled to Edwards who approached and shoved McCartney. McCartney shoved Edwards back, who then pulled out a handgun and shot him in the face.
When asked about November 13, 2013, the witness said he was at the Central Detective Unit providing the police with information about the incident in Gambier.
He said police showed him a photo album where he picked out the persons he saw on the night in question.
“The Crown has not disclosed to me anything about any photos,” Ms Butler said in her objection.
The witness’ testimony continued where he said that four days later, he saw the same women during his time in custody.
When asked by Thompson if he saw those women in court, Mrs Farquharson-Seymour objected.
“He’s gone through his entire case. We humbly submit sufficient ground work has not been laid for identification based on what this witness has said,” Ingraham’s lawyer argued.
The judge overruled the objection on the basis that the issue had been canvassed in prior legal discussions.
Witness “AB”, who was giving video link testimony while behind an opaque screen from an undisclosed location, picked out Ingraham and Curry as the two women to whom he had given a ride and had seen in Gambier the night of the shooting.
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