JUSTICE Brassington Reynolds on Thursday upheld a no-case submission and directed the mixed jury to return a verdict of not guilty in favour of murder accused Troy Holligan and Ojay Gourie.Addressing the freed men, Justice Reynolds said: “Seize the opportunity to make use of your life. You are free to go.”

Within seconds, the men had flown into the arms of overjoyed relatives, overpowered by relief and euphoria, with tears streaming down their faces.

“It’s (been) five years,” they recounted as they referred to their period of incarceration as remand prisoners.

State Counsel Ms Judith Mursalin was congratulated for her fairness, while Defence lawyer Peter Hugh was praised for his astuteness.

Earlier, Justice Reynolds noted that the evidence of Kumarie Samaroo was so manifestly unreliable as to misidentify the men in the dock. Further, the witness, in her evidence, had claimed to have seen the men in her home on March 27 2010, but at the time when the identification parade was conducted, she never submitted a statement to support her claim.

Justice Reynolds noted that it was at the magistrate’s court during the preliminary investigations that the witness first made mention of seeing the accused persons.

Justice Reynolds was also alarmed at the evidence of Deputy Police Superintendent Steven Booker, who had failed to adhere to the rules of an identification parade by failing to have persons in the lineup with similar physical characteristics.

It was further noted that the identical eight men were held in the lineup of both parades, although Holligan and Gourie are very different in physical appearance from those men.

Booker told the court that he had conducted separate identification parades at 15:55 hrs and at 15:58 hrs respectively on April 22, 2010 at the Whim Police Station, and that the main prosecution witness, Kumarie Samaroo, had taken seconds to identify the accused men. However, policeman Lawrence Thomas told the court that he had taken the suspects from Central Police Station at 16:15hrs on April 22, 2010 and had proceeded to the Whim Police Station, where the identification parade was held.

Justice Reynolds noted that Kumarie Samaroo had said in her evidence that she had taken twenty minutes and ten minutes respectively to identify the suspects, instead of seconds as stated by Officer Booker.

It was, moreover, observed that Booker had himself

misidentified the accused men in the dock.

Justice Reynolds observed that there was nothing from the police which constituted a basis for the arrest of the accused men.

It was further observed that the evidence of Government Pathologist Dr. Vivikanand Brijmohan, who performed a post mortem on March 30, 2010, revealed that death was due to a lacerated femoral wound, and the findings were not linked to gunshot injury, as the prosecution wanted the court to believe.

In her opening address, the Assistant Director of Public Prosecution said that at sometime around 19:00 hrs on the evening of March 27, 2010, New Amsterdam market vendors Hansraj Samaroo and his wife Kumarie were at their home at Hampshire Village, Corentyne. Hansraj was watching television in the living room in the upper flat of the two-storeyed building whilst his wife was cooking in the kitchen downstairs.
The lights were on in the house, and as Kumarie was cooking, she was confronted by a man with a gun. She called out to her husband, and the man with the gun used the inner stairs and went up to where her husband was. She then heard what sounded like a gunshot being discharged.

Kumarie then went upstairs and observed the said man with the gun. She also saw her husband standing there bleeding from his groin.
Kumarie also saw two other men, who were also armed with what appeared to be guns. She was relieved of a total of G$600,000 and US$1500, which was in her wardrobe, along with five gold bangles and five gold finger rings valued at $400,000, which she had on her person.

The injured Hansraj Samaroo was taken to the New Amsterdam Hospital, but was subsequently transferred to the Georgetown Public Hospital, where he died on March 28, 2010.