K&VC, Diamond killings head for inquest

Jul 20, 2015 News

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– informant disappointed

The case against a group of police ranks who are being accused of extra judicial killing by a well known informant is heading for an inquest.
Head of the Police Complaints Authority Cecil Kennard recently informed this newspaper that he has concurred with earlier advice by the Director of Public Prosecution that an inquest be held to determine if the police are criminally responsible for the killing of three youths outside the K&VC International Hotel on South Road in October 2013.
Kennard also made the same recommendation in the case involving the killing of two other youths at Diamond, East Bank Demerara two months later.
The same set of police ranks were implicated in both shooting incidents.
The allegations were made by self confessed informant Lennox Wayne called ‘Two Colours’, who claimed that he was working closely with the police ranks when the shootings occurred.
In fact Wayne, who is currently on remand for murder, had given investigators detailed statements of his involvement in the shootings and the actions of the police.
He came forward with the bombshell information, because according to him, the police “used him, set him up and then framed him.”
In explaining his recommendation to have the matter go to an inquest, Justice Kennard said that there were a number of inconsistencies in the statements given by Wayne and there is no clear possibility that if the ranks were to be charged that there will be a conviction.

The DPP had already ordered an inquest into the deaths of the victims and Kennard said that he agreed with that decision.
Hence there might be no need for the file with the new revelations to be sent back to the DPP’s Chambers.
Lennox Wayne in an explosive recording two months ago had claimed that the unit was responsible for the controversial deaths of five “criminal suspects”.
He spoke of the killing of three young men on South Road, outside the K&VC International Hotel and two others in the Diamond Housing Scheme.
On October 12, 2013, Cousins Jermaine Canterbury, 21, and Mark Anthony Joseph, called ‘Two Grand’, 19, and Romario Gouveia, 19, all residents of Albouystown, were shot during what police said was a shootout near the K&VC Hotel. The cousins died soon after the shooting while Gouveia, who had a gunshot wound to the jaw, died suddenly two days later.
On December 7, 2013 at Diamond, East Bank Demerara, Paul Bascom, a resident of Diamond Housing Scheme and Alberto Grant, or Alberto Mustapha, 28, called ‘Mukie’, of Lot 299 Meadow Brook Gardens were shot dead during an alleged 20-minute shootout with police.

Wayne is maintaining that while the police had claimed that the men were all shot dead during armed confrontations, the youths were gunned down without firing one single bullet at the police.
In one of the incidents, the youths actually put up their hands in an act of surrender, but were still mowed down by members of the police squad.
“Dem saying that de men shoot at dem…de men ain’t discharge no round, dem ain’t had no gun, de men ain’t had no weapon, straight,” he stressed.
He said that the weapon (.38 revolver) that the police produced was one that one of the ranks brought in a haversack.
He said that relatives of the dead men started to accuse him of orchestrating their deaths.
“That is how de whole country got it. Everybody know me. Remember is some youth men that me and dem used to do thing. Remember I used to thief, dat is why dem men had trust in me. Is then everybody now know dat I working with de police force,” the former convict stated.
Wayne said that it was that incident that caused him to start rethinking his link to the police, since he was now exposed to the public as a “police informer”.
On Friday when he heard that the matter was going to an inquest, Wayne told this newspaper that while he is disappointed with the decision, he was not surprised.
He said that it has now left him exposed, since the policemen are still in their jobs and are being covered.
Kaieteur News understands that two of the ranks implicated by Wayne have been transferred to the Presidential Guard.
“All the time when criminal shoot police, you don’t hear about inquest, but when police shooting innocent people you hearing about inquest,” Wayne said.
“I had my doubts, l had my own experience with the police,” he added.
According to Wayne, it was the police who approached him to be an informant when he was released from prison after he had served several years for armed robbery.
He said that since he was in a certain position, he agreed to work along with the police, knowing the consequences that the decision would bring.
“You have to use a criminal to get to other high profile criminals,” Wayne told this newspaper.
He said that his role was just to identify and infiltrate criminal groups and have the police arrest them.
However, he said that instead of arresting the suspects, the police began shooting them, although they were not involved in criminal activity at the time.
He disclosed that for his work he received a “raise” from the police, even identifying a former commander as one who gave given him a cash incentive for his work.
Former Home Affairs Minister Clement Rohee had vehemently denied that he had knowledge of any elite police anti crime unit that was fingered by Wayne in the extra judicial killings.
Kaieteur News understands that the unit was disbanded last year after reports that they were operating outside of their mandate and were not reporting specifically to their superiors in the Guyana Police Force.
Wayne’s relationship with the police turned sour after a deal between him and one of the ranks to execute businessman Mohamed F Khan went sour.
Wayne in another explosive recording earlier this year had confessed to being the gunman in a failed attempt to execute Khan, whose dismembered body was later found at Cummings Lodge.
One of the policemen who was integrally involved in the MFK plot has been charged with conspiracy to commit murder.
Last week Police Commissioner Seelall Persaud announced that ranks who are charged for serious criminal offences, will face immediate dismissal from the Force.
The move is being seen as intensifying efforts to rid the force of rogue cops, a process started by newly appointed Minister of National Security, Khemraj Ramjattan.
Previously, police ranks placed before the courts would be interdicted from duty and receive half their salary until the end of their legal matter, when they would draw down on the accumulated other half which sometimes amounts to hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars.
They are in most cases reinstated and continue to work as police ranks.  But according to Commissioner Persaud those days are over.
“You are charged and go before the court for certain types of offences, corruption and some other types relating to excessive force and deliberate criminal activity….simultaneously with going to court, you are losing the job,” the Commissioner declared.
“So it’s not a half salary now and then cash in on the other half five, six years after…It’s that you immediately have to look for another job to pay your lawyers and everybody else,” he added.

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