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Elderly woman killed at Canal Number Two…
Voir dire underway to determine admissibility of statement of accused
A voir dire (trial within a trial) is underway before Justice Navindra Singh at the High Court to determine the admissibility of a caution statement which was procured from one of the four men accused of killing Canal Number Two resident, Budhia.
Murdered Canal Number Two resident ‘Budhia’
Sixty eight year-old Budhia also called ‘Ronui was murdered during a robbery at her home in Conservancy Dam at Canal Number Two, West Bank Demerara, (WBD). The woman was at the time sharing the home with her daughter and 13 year-old granddaughter.
A post mortem examination conducted on the body of the elderly woman, determined the cause of death to be asphyxia due to manual strangulation.
Police investigations led to the arrests of Nigel Sookram, Steve Sookdeo called ‘Coolie Boy’, Roy Anthony Sewnarine and Vishal Seecharan called “Markie,” who were subsequently charged for the murder.
The men are on trial at the High Court before Justice Singh and a mixed twelve-member jury. The accused are being represented by Attorneys -at-Law Huckumchand Parag and Raymond Alli.
On Tuesday, the caution statement of Steve Sookdeo was admitted into the trial after a voir dire was conducted to determine the admissibility of his statement. According to the statement which was read aloud to the court by Police witness, Devon Bowen, Sookdeo told investigators that he, “Nigel, Markie and Roy,” had planned the robbery which took place on October, 20 2008.
Sookdeo had detailed that he and his colleagues had hired a car at Herstelling, East Bank Demerara and travelled to Canal Number Two, WBD where they broke into the house and tied up “the old lady” and other occupants of the one storey building before robbing them of cash and jewelry.
At the commencement of the matter on Monday, State Prosecutor Judith Gildharie Mursalin, called the victim’s daughter, Basmattie Rampersaud to the stand.
Rampersaud recalled the night of the incident. She told the court that thieves broke into her house and made off with more than a million dollars in cash and jewelry.
She said that the bandits bound the occupants of the house, all females, including her elderly mother using duct tape. The woman said that the perpetrators not only robbed and terrorized her elderly mother, but that she was killed in the process.
Pointing to the prisoner’s dock, she identified Sookram, Sookdeo and Seecharan as the three perpetrators who had entered the house that night. Rampersaud told the court that the men had even threatened to rape her if she did not give them what they wanted—all the jewelry and money in the house.
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