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Witness who recanted testimony charged with perjury
Kaieteur News – A twenty-five-year-old Kitty resident, who recanted his entire testimony in a murder trial, was arrested and is slated to appear in court to answer to a perjury charge.
Pascale Smith called “Pop Skull” 29, of Barr Street, Kitty, Georgetown, was last week freed of a 2017 murder charge after the eyewitness, who had identified him as the suspect in the case recanted his entire testimony. Smith was on trial for the murder of John Heckert Hutson, a Rastafarian resident of Kitty. He was charged for murdering Hutson on May 27, 2017, on a parapet on Alexander St, Kitty, Georgetown.
His trial commenced in the Demerara Assizes on January 18, 2021, before Justice Brassington Reynolds.
The case was prosecuted by Counsel from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Office, Seeta Bishundial, and Lisa Cave, and Smith was represented by Attorney-at-Law Siand Dhurjon.
On Wednesday, February 16, 2022, Justice Reynolds upheld a no-case submission that was made to the court by Smith’s lawyer and as such, Smith was set free.
Kaieteur News reported that the prosecution’s case against Smith was that during the wee hours of April 31, 2017, he had beaten Hutson mercilessly on the road in front of the Avon building on Alexander Street in Kitty, by stamping him to the ground and striking him to the head with a brick until he was motionless.
An eyewitness ran to the Kitty Police Station and reported the matter, while Hutson was taken, in an unconscious state, to the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC). Hutson was hospitalised for over a month succumbed on May 27, 2017.
Following Hutson’s death, Smith was arrested at his home and was positively identified as the suspect by an eyewitness on an identification parade at the Kitty Police Station.
Later that year, Senior Magistrate Leron Daly, found that there was sufficient evidence against Smith for him to stand trial in the High Court for murder.
However, on February 10, 2022, when eyewitness Budhu Persaud, 25, also a resident of the Kitty area, was called to the witness stand to testify in the murder case, he recanted his testimony.
Under cross-examination from Smith’s lawyer, Persaud was asked if he remembered the date of the incident and he told the court “no.”
When asked if he remembered any incident in 2017 that had caused him to interact with the police he also said “no.”
Persaud then explained that sometime during the year, a police detective by the name of “Chapman” encouraged and caused him to sign a paper and also caused him to attend the identification parade and to point out Smith.
The prosecution had applied for Persaud to be deemed a hostile witness, but the defence lawyer objected and the judge ruled that there was no foundation or basis for Persaud to be so treated.
Following Persaud’s testimony, the Prosecution declined to call any further witness to testify and closed their case.
Smith’s lawyer then made a no-case submission to the court and said that what Persaud said is the truth and in keeping with his police statement in 2017, as well as a statement given on January 31, 2022, which was not disclosed until during the trial.
As such Justice Reynolds upheld the defence’s submission and directed the 12-member jury to give a formal verdict of not guilty.
On Monday, the Guyana Police Force (GPF) in a statement noted that they have arrested the witness and questioned him in relation to an alleged ‘wilfull and corrupt’ act of perjury.
The police reported that during the interview with Persaud, he was first cautioned in accordance with the Judge’s ruling and he elected to tell his story.
Persaud reportedly told investigators that he did give a written statement to the police at Kitty Police Station detailing what he witnessed when Hutson was brutally attacked. He added that a few weeks later, he had attended and positively identified the suspect at an identification parade and subsequently testified during the preliminary inquiry (PI) in the matter at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts before Senior Magistrate Leron Daly.
According to the police, Persaud told them that sometime in January 2021, he was taken to the accused father, who threatened him.
He explained that the accused father told him that if he did not change his story he would face the consequences.
As such, he disclosed that when he appeared in the High Court to testify in the matter, he related that he knew nothing about the matter. Persaud is slated to appear in the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts this week.
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