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Henry boys’ murder trial
…second accused tells court never crossed Berbice Bridge
(Kaieteur News) – Vinod Gopaul, one of the two men accused of butchering Isaiah and Joel Henry back in September 2020, on Thursday sought to declare his innocence when he took the stand before Justice Simone Morris-Ramlall at the Berbice High Court.
Justice Morris -Ramlall established that there was sufficient evidence for Gopaul to lead the defence.
Similar to Sanchara, Gopaul declared he has never visited the Cotton Tree backdam in West Coast Berbice, nor has any knowledge of any marijuana farm.
The 35-year-old murder accused noted that he grew up in Black Bush Polder, Corentyne, Berbice, but has never even ventured across the Berbice Bridge.
Vinod Gopaul at the Berbice High Court
Akash Singh, whose damning testimony struck hard against the two, singled out Gopaul as the aggressor who set the murder of the cousins in motion. Singh had said that he, along with Gopaul and Sanchara, visited the location in August 2020, to tend to their marijuana farm. After planting, they left and returned three weeks later, only to find that the farm was chemically destroyed. Singh related to the court that Gopaul was more incensed than anyone else, and vowed in rage that “somebody got to pay for it.”
Gopaul disclosed that some police ranks visited his home and told him he was wanted at the station, after Singh made allegations pertaining to firearms. On September 6, 2020, he said he was in police custody and during this period, he was only questioned about possession of firearms.
According to Gopaul, he only became aware of the accusation of murdering the two boys in January 2021, when police visited him again.
“Seven o’clock a Sunday morning, I see a set of police come. SWAT team, a set of police, soldiers, a set of them come and circle around me house. I was downstairs with me mother,” he told the court.
He recalled that the police told him he is needed in Georgetown and when he inquired the reason, he was told that it would be divulged when he arrived at the location. This, he stated, would be the very first time he left Region Six.
“All my life, I born and grow in Black Bush Polder. I never crossed that bridge. When the police come the Sunday morning and take me from my mother home and escort me to the Eve Leary headquarters, that’s the first time,” Gopaul said.
Countering Singh’s claims, Gopaul, much like his co-accused Sanchara, said that Singh was a pawn in the hands of the police, and that he had no knowledge of anything Singh accused him and Sanchara of. Singh had told the court that the men forced him to chop the teens, and that his role was to carve an x on the bodies.
Gopaul also revealed that the police brutalised him while in custody, causing his leg to be broken, after he refused to accept whatever Akash Singh stated in his admissions to police.
The prosecution, led by Marisa Edwards, suggested that the police never threatened or harmed Gopaul. She told him that he himself said that he was comfortable while in custody, which he flatly denied. Edwards also put to Gopaul that he operated the weed farm as part of his livelihood, and its destruction infuriated him, leading him and his accomplices to kill the two cousins who happened to be in the area between September 5 and 6, 2020. Gopaul, she suggested, fired a chop with a cutlass to the neck of the taller of the boys, and encouraged Sanchara and Singh to follow.
“I never see this boy in my life,” Gopaul exclaimed. He said that he and the other two never chopped anyone, effectually vindicating Singh too, who admitted to the killings.
On the other hand, Sanchara, who spoke on Wednesday, completed his statements on Thursday morning, but had some fragments in his summary.
In denying that he was at Cotton Tree, Sanchara stated there was no koker at the specific location, then adjusted to say that he never went to Cotton Tree.
With that aspect of the trial completed, the matter resumes on Tuesday for the summation.
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