(Trinidad Guardian) – The common-law wife of a man accused of kidnapping eight-year-old Leah Lammy smiled on Tuesday after she was granted $25,000 bail by a Chaguanas magistrate.
Samantha Persad, 21, a store clerk, is accused of receiving stolen jewellery belonging to murdered teenager Gail Durity, and Sally Lobai, who has been missing since February 11. Around 3.20 pm, Persad walked out of the prisoner’s dock and entered a silver car after securing bail.
Earlier, police had to shield her from an angry crowd, most of them women, who had converged outside the court’s compound eagerly waiting to see her. When the crowd spotted Persad being escorted to the courthouse in a pair handcuffs, they rushed towards her and jeered but the police kept them off. Persad kept her head bent, her hair covering her face. She was arrested last Wednesday after police raided her home at Line Lane Street, Felicity. The police claim they found several pieces of jewellery at her home.
The first charge said some time between February 11 and April 29, at Line Lane Street, Persad received a stolen silver chain and a heart pendant valued $150, belonging to Lobai.
The other charge stated that between June 1, 2008, and April 29, 2009, at the same address, she received two silver chains valued $200 belonging to Durity. Persad was not called upon to plead to the charges. The court prosecutor did not object to bail. Her attorney Nalini Bansee said her client had no previous convictions or pending matters and asked for disclosure.
The matter was adjourned to May 15. Relatives of Persad’s common-law husband, Salis Mack, were present in court. Mack, a PH driver, is before the same magistrate, charged with stealing Leah Lammy’s phone and kidnapping her. Leah has not been seen since she left Edinburgh Government Primary School on February 10.
