The Tribune

By PAVEL BAILEY

Tribune Staff Reporter

pbailey@tribunemedia.net

A MAN failed last month to overturn his 45-year prison sentence for a 2019 Mackey Street murder.

Dwayne Lodimus, 32, had his murder conviction upheld by Justices of Appeal Indra Charles, Bernard Turner and Gregory Hilton.

Lodimus shot and killed Elroy “Skully” Burrows, 40, while he was near a pharmacy on Mackey Street shortly before 11am on May 19, 2019.

Sergeant Daniel Gabriel testified that while he was at a lodge hall on Wilton Street, he heard eight to ten gunshots.

Looking east, Sergeant Gabriel saw a man running from the murder scene while holding a gun. The officer saw the suspect enter a silver two-door Honda Accord through the window on Palm Beach Street. Despite the officer’s efforts to stop them, the suspects escaped.

Lodimus was arrested on April 8, 2019, after he and his brother, Anton Lodimus, were stopped in the same vehicle in a Wendy’s parking lot at the Golden Gates Shopping Centre.

A black Smith & Wesson 9mm pistol and 13 rounds of ammunition were recovered from the passenger seat of the vehicle.

Sergeant Gabriel identified Dwayne Lodimus as the man who ran past him on the day of the murder during an identification parade on April 10, 2019.

Forensic evidence linked the gun recovered from the car to the murder.

Lodimus was convicted of the offence at the end of his trial before Justice Renae McKay on September 7, 2023.

In his conviction appeal, Lodimus argued that the trial judge erred in rejecting his no-case submission because the identification evidence was weak and unreliable. The defence further claimed the trial judge failed to properly direct the jury on surveillance and identification evidence, and misdirected the jury about the search of the vehicle in which the firearm was recovered. Lodimus claimed the conviction was unsafe and unsatisfactory.

The Justices of Appeal found that the trial judge was correct to reject the no-case submission. They found the prosecution’s evidence was sound and that the trial judge properly directed the jury. While the justices acknowledged that Lodimus was identified after a brief observation by a stranger, they said there was substantial evidence linking him to the crime.

For those reasons, they ruled that the conviction was neither unsafe nor unsatisfactory.

James Thomson represented Lodimus, while Darnelle Dorsette appeared for the prosecution.