Discharged for murders: but back in court again for same crime, spate of armed robberies

Apr 30, 2017 Court Stories, Features / Columnists, News

---

Two known individuals to law enforcements officers who were recently told they were free to leave the courtroom after murder indictments against them were discharged are back in court again; this time one of them for the same crime and the other for robbing church members at gunpoint.
It has been less than six months since Regan ‘Grey Boy’ Rodrigues was discharged of the murder of political activist, Courtney Crum-Ewing.
However, on Good Friday the 33-year-old murder accused was re-arrested by police at a house in Middle Road La Penitence, Georgetown, nearly a month after the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) ordered that the case be reopened for the taking of further evidence from police witnesses and to rule on the voluntariness of all oral statements of Rodrigues.
Attorney Nigel Hughes has been assigned to prosecute this case again.
But after hearing that the case would be reopened, Rodrigues went into hiding since on countless occasions he failed to report to the Criminal Investigation Department Headquarters (CID) Eve Leary, Georgetown. While he was in hiding Rodrigues released at least two video recordings professing his innocence.
In one of the videos that were widely circulated on social media, Rodrigues said he believes there is a plot to have him go down for the murder. He had also appealed to the Guyana Police Force to assign new ranks to the case which will see the real killer being caught and brought to justice.
According to Rodrigues the Guyana Police Force should investigate their own ranks since they are knowledgeable about what happened to the political activist.
“They want I suffer for their crime. This country ain’t got justice that is why people does turn bad. I leave them in the hands of God,” he had stated.
After the first murder indictment was read to him in 2015, Rodrigues claimed that he knew the person who killed Crum-Ewing. And that the same person had also asked him to kill Crum-Ewing and Mark Benchop but he refused and reported that matter to police who never took his statement.
Rodrigues was brought to the Georgetown Magistrates’ Court last week and hurled a series of insulting remarks at Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Mitchell Caesar, resulting in the senior cop refusing to testify.
This matter continues on Wednesday.
According to reports, the bullet-riddled body of Crum-Ewing was found at Third Avenue, Diamond New Scheme East Bank Demerara on March 10, 2015.
The 40-year-old was shot twice to the temple, once to the back of the head and twice to the stomach. The police in a statement had said that the political activist was accosted by four men in a car, one of whom discharged several rounds, hitting him about the body. It was reported that the killer(s) used a .32 pistol to execute Crum-Ewing.
Magistrate Latchman had pointed out that one of the court’s reasons for discharging the matter was because there was no evidence to support that the firearm tendered during the PI was used by Rodrigues to kill the political activist although she believed the gun, a .32 revolver, was confiscated by police during a raid at Rodrigues’s home.
The prosecution’s inability to make out a prima facie was once again highlighted when the Magistrate disclosed that the prosecutor failed to request the court to rule on the admissibility of caution statements allegedly made by Rodrigues.
While stating that several inferences can be drawn from those statements, Magistrate Latchman underscored that they did not implicate Rodrigues in the murder of Crum-Ewing.
Meanwhile, three weeks after he was discharged on a murder charge Negus Lamazon, 21, was arraigned before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan again to answer to four counts of robbery under-arms which alleged that he robbed four church members at gunpoint of $759,000 in gold and diamond jewellery and cell phones.
Kaieteur News understands that approximately 20 persons were attending a farewell and were sitting on the northern pavement of Regent Street on April 10, when they were allegedly robbed by Lamazon and his accomplice Corinth Taylor, who was also slapped with the said charges.
Police said the men arrived from the western direction and came off their motorcycles, pointed their guns at the victims and robbed them.
Some persons resisted and the gunmen fired about six shots in the air and made good their escape south along Oronoque Street.
Kaieteur News understands that two of the men escaped on a motorcycle while the other bandit escaped on foot and left his motorcycle behind. A motorcycle used during the commissioning of the robbery was confiscated by police.
An attorney for Taylor revealed that his client was arrested after he went to the Alberttown Police Station to report his motorcycle stolen. On the other hand, Lamazon of D’Urban Street was captured at Springlands, Corentyne, Berbice while en route to Suriname.
Both of the alleged robbers have been remanded to prison until May 8.
Magistrate Dylon Bess had discharged a murder charge against Lamazon which had alleged that he and Samuel Mc Intyre killed former murder accused Orin ‘Malik’ David who was shot dead in front of his Laing Avenue, West Ruimveldt, Georgetown home on August 1, 2016. The charge was also discharged against McIntyre.

---

---