Ex-wife freed of cop’s murder

May 23, 2014 News

After almost five years of incarceration, Desiree Jeffers was declared a free woman, after a mixed 12-member jury, found her not guilty of the 2011 murder of Police Detective Igris Bobb-Blackman.

Desiree Jeffers

Jeffers, 61, of La Parfaite Harmonie, West Bank Demerara, embraced her relatives as she left the courtroom of Justice Dawn Gregory, yesterday.
She was on trial for the murder, which occurred sometime between January 18 and January 20, 2011.
According to reports, the bound body of the Detective Constable Bobb-Blackman was pulled from a septic tank located aback of a property that he had shared with Jeffers, his then reputed wife, two days after he went missing.
The gruesome discovery was made by Blackman’s brother Ptolemy, who was part of a search team that was looking for him after he went missing. The victim’s head was badly mutilated with several chop wounds, his hands and feet were bound and the body was wrapped in a coloured carpet.
However, while Jeffers denied having any knowledge of how the policeman met his demise, his relatives were convinced that she and several other persons were responsible for his death, since he had recently taken out a protection order against her.
The couple was also engaged in the High Court for the division of a $12M property they jointly owned.
During the trial, Prosecution witnesses Gail Franker and Claudine Bobb- Blackman claimed that Jeffers had threatened to harm Blackman on numerous occasions.
However in leading her defence, Jeffers denied any knowledge of the murder.
“I never threatened anyone or killed Bobb-Blackman,” she stated.
Jeffers told the court that the relationship between her and the policeman ended, after she found out that he was gay and had the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV).
She said that she was at another residence in Georgetown, when she heard that Bobb- Blackman was missing.
Jeffers said that she went to her residence on the West Bank of Demerara, where she later learnt of the policeman’s death.
Earlier in the trial, the victim’s brother, Brentnol Bobb-Blackman told the court that he identified the body, which was pulled from the septic tank on January 20, 2011 to be his brother, who was missing for more than 24 hours.
He claimed he had reported his brother missing at La Grange Police Station on January 18, 2011. He also said that he had visited his brother at his Lot 622 La Parfaite Harmonie residence on numerous occasions, for religious functions among other things.
Bobb-Blackman told the court that it was as a result of a conversation he had with Gail Franker that he went in search of his brother at the said address. Franker was also in relationship with the policeman.

Dead: Igris Bobb-Blackman

“Myself, Gail Franker, police officers and the accused returned to the house and we checked the yard which included the septic tank, again…I looked into the septic tank and saw a yellow lighter, a bottle of ‘Seven Seas’ tablets, a notebook and a part of a multicoloured green carpet at the top of the water in the septic tank…Desiree Jeffers was there and she said ‘oh my God, oh my God I know nothing about this.”
Subsequent to the Jury’s announcement that they had arrived at a unanimous verdict of not guilty, the relatives of the deceased expressed their discontent at the outcome.
“We are not satisfied with the outcome here today but we believe that there is a God and He is just and He always delivers justice.”
Jeffers was represented by Attorney Peter Hugh, while the State was represented by Prosecutors Natasha Backer and Mercedes Thompson.