Retrial for 2011 Doobay murder commences… Court hears accused tell police of plot to murder woman

Jan 28, 2016 Court Stories, Features / Columnists, News

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Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), Joel David, yesterday recounted the statement that murder accused, Shakir Mohamed, gave to investigators after he was arrested for killing the wife of prominent Medical Practitioner, Dr. Ramsundar

Doobay.
The retrial for Mohamed began at the Georgetown High Court on Tuesday.  According to the indictment, Shakir Mohamed is alleged to have murdered Mrs.  Shewraney Doobay at her Echilibar Villas, Campbellville residence, on May 24, 2011.
The woman‘s battered body was discovered in a pool of blood in the kitchen of her home. The incident reportedly stemmed from a dispute over a piece of property.
Subsequent to police investigations, Mohamed and the dead woman’s nephew, Mark Singh, were charged for the murder.
It is alleged that Singh was the main player in the crime while Mohamed played a role in cushioning the act.
Singh, of Prince William Street, Plaisance East Coast Demerara is now deceased.  It was reported that Singh took ill while at the Camp Street Prison. He was rushed to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, (GPHC) and later succumbed to acute asthma.
According to the statement tendered as evidence before the court, yesterday, the remaining accused, Mohamed gave a vivid description of how Mrs. Doobay met her demise.
The statement was narrated by Officer David. The statement outlined that Mohamed had met with the victim’s nephew (Singh) about two weeks before the crime was committed.
Mohamed told the police that Singh confided in him about a property issue, he had with his aunt.  The accused recalled that Singh told him that he was paying his aunt’s rates and taxes and that “It was getting to he and he plan fuh kill she.”
The court heard that Mohamed later recalled that on May 24, 2011 he and Singh were at the home of Mrs. Doobay, but Singh was the one who took a hammer and clubbed his aunt to the head with it.
The statement outlined that the woman screamed once but Singh continued to bludgeon his aunt in presence of Mohamed, who helped to ease her to the floor.
At which point, the witness said that Mohamed recalled that the woman was still moving but Singh dealt her final blow to the head with the hammer.
Assistant Commissioner of Police, Marlon Chapman, also testified yesterday.
He said that he witnessed the taking of the caution statement by Officer David from the accused. He told the court that Mohamed dictated the events as David recorded it on the Caution Statement form.
Chapman also testified that he was present when Mohamed along with his co-accused at the time (Mark Singh) took police to the place and pointed a spot where the murder weapon was thrown following their arrest for the murder.
He said that police ranks had searched a drain a short distance away from where the victim once resided and they recovered the hammer; it was wrapped in a black plastic bag.
On Tuesday, Mohamed 33, of Lot 127 Latchmi Street, Better Hope, East Coast Demerara, and (ECD) pleaded not guilty to the charge before Justice Navindra Singh and a mixed twelve-member jury.  This is his second trial before a Judge and Jury for the offence. He had previously faced Justice Brassington Reynolds for the murder.
At this trial, Mohamed is being represented by Attorney- at- law Maxwell Mc Kay.   State Prosecutors, Narissa Leander, Siand Dhurjon and Michael Shahoud are presenting the case.
Approximately 13 witnesses will be called to the stand during the trial. The State has since called the victim’s nephew, Jaswant Tiwari, Police Corporal Devon Lowe, Police Detective Lakeram Dath.
The first witness (Tiwari) told the court that he identified the body of dead aunt at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, (GPHC) mortuary, in the presence of Dr. Nehaul Singh and a policeman.
He said that a few days after he witnessed a cremation of his aunt’s remains.
Similarly, Police Corporal   Devon Lowe testified that he witnessed the identification of the body at GPHC morgue.  Lowe also witnessed the Post Mortem, (PM) examination which was conducted on the body.
The Police Corporal told the court that prior to that Mrs.  Doobay was taken to the Accident and Emergency Unit of GPHC, where she was pronounced dead on arrival.
Detective Dath later presented the court with approximately forty photographs, which were taken at the scene of the crime.
According to his testimony when police investigators visited the crime scene, Mrs Doobay was found lying motionless on the kitchen floor of her home.
Dath recalled that a wound was present to the head of the victim and there was a red substance which appeared to be blood on the ground. The witness recounted that there was also a red substance which looked like blood on the wall, two glasses in the sink and a blue Banks DIH bag containing cash in another part of the two-storey building.
The policeman took several photographs at the scene. These were later developed at the Police Crime Lab.  The photographs were also tendered as evidence in the trial.

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