Video footage of KN grenade attack shown in court

The preliminary inquiry into the charges against Alfie Garraway, Janiel Howard and Leroy Williams, the three men accused of throwing a grenade outside Kaieteur News, continued on Monday with CCTV footage of the night in question being shown to the court.

The three men are charged with unlawfully and maliciously conspiring with other persons to cause an explosion by way of using a grenade, which was likely to endanger life or cause serious damage to property.

The courtroom of Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan heard the evidence-in-chief of prosecution witness Detective Corporal Junior Blair.

Blair, who is a supervising officer in charge of the forensic video and analyst unit attached to Police Headquarters at Eve Leary, testified about the video footage he recovered from the CCTV cameras at Kaieteur News.

The Chief Magistrate also viewed three videos and a PowerPoint presentation of Blair’s analysis report of the videos he extracted from the cameras.

Defence lawyers Stanley Moore and Neil Bollers, who were present at Monday’s proceedings, deferred cross-examining the witness until the next hearing.

Apart from Blair, Detective Hobert Henry and Somal Sharma, the Network Administrator at Kaieteur News, also testified.

The inquiry was later adjourned until November 24.

The grenade, which was thrown near the vehicle of Kaieteur News’ publisher Glen Lall on the night a wake was being held for one of the company’s employees, did not explode.

The police had said that after reviewing surveillance footage, ranks detained a car matching the description of the vehicle along with six suspects, three of whom— Garraway, 36, of Lot 71 Norton Street, Howard, 20, of Lot 322 Section ‘C’ Turkeyen and Williams, 25, of Lot 11 D’Urban Backlands—were subsequently charged.