Finding that their defence was insufficiently put to a jury, the Guyana Court of Appeal yesterday quashed the convictions against Ray Yokum, Steffon Campbell and Faisal Moore; while ordering that they face a fresh trial for the 2012 murder of Glen Xavier.
Xavier was fatally shot during a robbery at the Cornbread Mini Mart located on D’Urban Street, Georgetown on the night of May 9th, 2012.
In 2017, the jointly-charged trio was convicted and sentenced to 80 years each for the offence.
They would later appeal their sentence and conviction, arguing among other things that they had nothing to do with the crime and that their respective defences had not been adequately put to the jury by the trial judge.
The police had relied on alleged caution statements (CS) to prove its case, but the defence contended that Justice Navindra Singh had misdirected the jury on how to properly treat with alleged confessions purportedly flowing therefrom.
Delivering the judgment of the court yesterday afternoon, Chancellor Yonette Cummings-Edwards said the appellate court found the CS to have been properly admitted in evidence, backed by Justice Singh’s directions to the jury that it was a matter of fact for them whether they were satisfied to the extent they felt sure that the accused had said what the police alleged they did in the statements.
In the judgment, however, the court said that the trial judge ought to have gone further in directing the jury what would be required in circumstances where it may have been in doubt regarding the CS.
On this point the Chancellor said that the jury ought to have been told that it was the prosecution which had the burden of proving the case against the accused beyond reasonable doubt and that that is never a burden for the accused who under the law has nothing to prove.
The court reminded, too, that special care always needs to be taken in directing the jury that the statement of one accused, whether in a CS or otherwise, cannot be used against another to ground a conviction.
That evidence she said, is to be used only against the author of the particular statement, with other supporting evidence against another.
The police had said that Yokum and Moore called “Hard Mouth,” had provided CS, but both accused denied this.
Regarding the issue of the defences being put to the jury, the appellate court said it not only found that that was not adequately put to the jury, but that it was not put in a fair and balanced way either, when compared with how the trial judge had put the state’s case to the jury.
Chancellor Cummings-Edwards said it was found that the attempt by the trial judge at putting the case for the defence was done in a mere synopsis and not sufficiently dealt with in the manner the state’s case was put.
She explained that in an unbalanced way, the trial judge sought to destroy the case for the defence and focused more on the prosecution’s case which ultimately took away from the cases on both sides being fairly and adequately advanced.
In the circumstances, the three appellants who attended their hearing virtually, were informed by the Chancellor that their convictions would be quashed and they would be given a new trial at the next sitting of the Demerara criminal assizes which is likely to commence in early April.
The appeal was heard by the Chancellor and Justices of Appeal Dawn Gregory and Rishi Persaud.
Yokum was represented by Senior Counsel Stanley Moore, while Campbell, called “Burnham” and Moore were represented by attorney Nigel Hughes.
The state’s case meanwhile, was presented by Prosecutor Natasha Backer.
According to a CS which Lance Corporal Rodrick Melville had testified taking from Moore, the convict said that Xavier was shot and killed by a man whom he identified only as “Burnham.”
In a statement, which Detective Rodwell Sarabo had testified to taking from Yokum, this accused, too, said that he did not kill anyone, but only “link up de wuk,” which he passed on to “Hard Mouth,” and “Burnham.”
Yokum, the court had heard from the statement, told “Hard Mouth” and “Burnham,” to “do them thing properly.”
This accused was quoted in the statement as saying, “I didn’t kill them men. I link up Burnham and Hard Mouth with X, and they rob dem men, and it had to be dem kill dem men.”
Meanwhile, in the CS which Sarabo said he also took from Campbell, “Hard Mouth” was identified as the shooter.
The men had each denied knowing the other.
Xavier, 26, of Harlem, West Coast Demerara was shot and killed after being robbed around 9 pm, at the Cornbread Mini Mart at D’Urban and Lime streets, Georgetown.
Armed with handguns, some men carried out the attack, before escaping with an undisclosed amount of cash on two Honda CG motorcycles.
The victim, who was shot in his chest and left hand, later succumbed to his injuries. He died from haemorrhage and shock, due to gunshot injuries.
Another man was injured during the shooting.
