Neesa Gopaul murder trial… Mom was present as lover killed daughter

Feb 27, 2015 Court Stories, Features / Columnists, News

Murdered: Neesa Gopaul

– former cellmate tells court

The long awaited testimony of the Prosecution’s star witness, Simone De Nobrega began yesterday, gripping the packed courtroom in the trial of Bibi Shareema Gopaul and her lover, Jarvis Barry Small, who are accused of murdering 16-year-old Queen’s College student, Neesa Gopaul.
The State witness who is also known as “Simone King,” took the stand yesterday before Justice Navindra Singh and a mixed 12-member jury.
De Nobrega, a former cellmate of Gopaul claimed that the woman had confided in her that she sat and watched as Small first strangled and then bashed her daughter’s skull before disposing of her body in a creek on the Linden/Soesdyke Highway.
The victim’s five-year-old sister, De Nobrega said, was sleeping in the car while Gopaul remained unmoved as her daughter begged for her life.
De Nobrega said she met and befriended Bibi Gopaul during a period of incarceration at the East La Penitence Police Station lockups.
As the witness gave her riveting testimony, the number two accused (Gopaul) fixed her eyes upon her. She sat upright in the prisoner’s dock while Small wore a blank expression on his face.
De Nobrega said that one night while they were in the lockups, she heard the accused saying “No Barry, stop Barry.” She said the woman appeared to be having a nightmare. De Nobrega noted that after Gopaul awoke, she kept looking over her shoulder as if something would happen.
The witness said that the woman expressed a desire to confide in her and she in turn assured her that she wouldn’t tell anyone what she had to say. De Nobrega said that it was then that Gopaul began to relate her story.
De Nobrega said that Gopaul then asked her if someone had died as a result of poisoning a year ago and the body was exhumed, whether an autopsy would reveal that the person died from poisoning.
“I told her I have no idea,” De Nobrega stated, adding that Gopaul told her that she “seemed like the type of person who knew a lot of people.”

Murder Accused: Bibi Shareema Gopaul

She said that Gopaul told her that she wanted someone to dig up her husband, Javed Gopaul’s grave. De Nobrega told the court that Gopaul confided that she would pay any price to have the work carried out.
The witness said that she became confused and Gopaul related that she wanted to tell her “something” that would make her understand her reason for making the request. At this point, De Nobrega said that Gopaul held her hand softly and said “it wasn’t me. Barry killed Neesa.”
The witness went on to say that Gopaul told her that she met Barry Small, a gym instructor, after she started to attend the gym. They then began having an affair.
According to the witness, Gopaul said that sometime later, she told her lover that she was not comfortable with her marriage and she wanted to be with him because he made her happy.
De Nobrega said that the woman told her that she had moved out of her matrimonial home, but returned for the sake of her two daughters Neesa and Miriam, and was hopeful that the marriage would get better, but instead it got worse.
She said that the victim’s mother had related that Small told her that the only way they could be together was if her husband was out of the picture. According to the cellmate, Gopaul’s lover had encouraged her to poison her husband and he gave her rat poison to add to his meals over a period of time.
Javed Gopaul was rushed to the hospital sometime after, where doctors diagnosed him with kidney failure.His wife was advised to take him home since there was nothing else the doctors could have done to save him.
The next day Javed Gopaul died and was buried a matter of hours after. Gopaul reportedly related that two weeks after her husband’s death, she was feeling sad, lonely and very depressed, and Small moved into her home. This angered the woman’s parents.
At this point, the witness related that Gopaul told her that her daughter Neesa had become very rude and disrespectful to her. She related that the teen started skipping school and staying out late.
De Nobrega said that Gopaul claimed that after awhile Small and Neesa started getting along extremely well. The woman said the accused recalled that she would be in her room and overhear conversations between her daughter and her (Bibi Gopaul’s) lover. The conversations, she said, would change whenever she entered the room.
Gopaul had related that Small had started to change; whenever Neesa was around he would be mean to her and whenever Neesa was not, he would treat her like a ‘total sweetheart’.
At this point, DeNobrega related that the woman said that she became depressed and Small gave her tablets to calm her nerves; she said that he told her to take eight tablets per day.
The witness said that the accused also revealed that Small had told her that Neesa had confided in him that she overheard a telephone conversation between her mother and another person; she overheard her mother telling the person on the other end of the line about how she had poisoned her father. He said that Neesa told him that her father had left them a lot of money.
The witness went on to say that on one occasion, Gopaul said when she tried to scold Neesa in relation to an issue, the teen got upset and told her that she knew that she had poisoned her father .
De Nobrega said that Gopaul also related that Small told her that they needed to get rid of Neesa because she would cause trouble.

Murder Accused: Jarvis Barry Small

According to the witness, Gopaul said that Small suggested selling the teenager to his friends in Venezuela for $2 million, but they didn’t go through with it since they believed that the girl would return home when she turned 18 and cause trouble.
Gopaul said that Small also suggested that they take the teen along the Soesdkye/ Linden Highway to a place where they would burn wood to make coals and throw her in, but she didn’t like the sound of that idea, because she felt they would come together and push her in instead.
The witness said that a few days later Gopaul told her two daughters that she was taking them to buy chicken and that they would pick up “Uncle Barry” at the Vreed- en-Hoop junction.
She said Neesa was seated in the front seat of the car and Small got in the seat directly behind the teenager. Her youngest daughter Miriam was seated next to him.
They went to Royal Castle and then to the seawall, and it was afterwards that they went for long drive along the Soesdyke/Linden Highway.
The witness said that Gopaul related when they were in the vicinity of Splashmin’s Fun Park, Small, who was seated behind the front passenger seat, placed a rope around Neesa’s neck and pull it, choking her, and she began to scream “mommy mommy, don’t kill me,”
According to the star witness, the teen began “fighting up” (kicking at the dashboard and steering wheel). The other child had fallen asleep.
The woman said that Gopaul told her that she drove for a mile down a trail and stopped at Emerald Towers Resort, “ Neesa’s favourite place”.
The witness said that Gopaul related that she stopped the car and Small got out. He took Neesa out of the car as she was panting for breath. Gopaul stood outside to ensure nobody else was around.
The woman said that Barry Small took Neesa around the car and she fell on her knees and began to call her little sister’s name “Miri, Miri wake up”.
Small, she said, then took a piece of wood from the trunk of the vehicle and began hitting Neesa repeatedly at the back of her head. He hit her until she was laying face down on the ground.
De Nobrega said Gopaul recalled that the last sounds she heard from her daughter sounded like groans. Shortly after, Neesa stopped making the noise. Small then picked up the teen’s lifeless body and placed it in the car trunk and they returned home.
De Nobrega said that Gopaul said the following morning she awoke and went to check to ensure Neesa was really dead. She didn’t want touch the body with her hands; she poked it with a stick.
De Nobrega said that Gopaul recounted that she reported her daughter missing and Barry Small instructed her to wrap the body in a sheet and place it in a suitcase with the girl’s passport and early saver bank card to make it appear as if she had run away from home. He told her to take weightlifting dumbbells which she had at her house, and they would attach it to the suitcase. He told her that the weights would keep the suitcase under water.
She said that they returned to the Emerald Tower Resort where they dumped the body in a creek.
The witness said that Gopaul recounted that Small thereafter instructed her to pack their bags and that they were going to leave for Suriname in case the police started suspecting that they had anything to do with Neesa’s death, but as she was packing her bags the following day the police came to the house. The police told her that they had found Neesa’s body and she needed to go with them to identify it.
In response to questions by the Prosecutor, De Nobrega told the court that she spoke to the accused for five consecutive days. The witness said that she subsequently spoke with her lawyer and the police to whom she gave a statement.
Asked what her reason was for telling her lawyer about the conversation she had with the accused, De Nobrega said “I am a mother and I love my two sons dearly and my job is to protect them …I couldn’t carry such a weight; I couldn’t live with myself. I believe Neesa deserved justice and no matter what, she didn’t deserve to die,” the witness said, staring in the direction of the prisoner’s dock. As she spoke her voice began to crack, she stopped and then continued “by the hands of someone she trusted; someone that was supposed to protect her, that’s why I told my lawyer.”
The witness went on to say that she submitted a statement to the police on October 20.
Asked why she had been in custody, De Nobrega said that she had been arrested for a number of obtaining credit by false pretence charges. The witness spoke slowly as she related this to the court. Asked whether she had been convicted, the witness replied in the affirmative. She told the court that she was sentenced to five years for the crimes, but she absconded because she received threats from persons who claimed they were linked to Neesa Gopaul.
De Nobrega said that she feared for life and that of her children. The prosecutor then asked the witness to describe how Gopaul appeared as she related the accounts.
De Nobrega responded “she didn’t seem remorseful one bit …not a single tear.”