At  Demerara Assizes…

JUSTICE Brassington Reynolds, who is in the process of conducting the third  in a series of voir dire (trial within a trial) in the Ogle murder case at the Demerara Assizes, has said he will not deliver his ruling until the last one is completed.

As a consequence, the jurors selected to try the four men for the unlawful killing of Teddy Smith, on October 24, 2004, have been in and out of the courtroom since the case began at the start of the January criminal sessions.

Meanwhile, in keeping with the procedure adopted by the Prosecution in cooperation with the Defence, leading the State Prosecutor Ganesh Hira has also deferred his opening address until after the judge rules.
Justice Reynolds, in this case, will have to rule on an application to permit additional evidence as well as to determine whether certain caution statements attributed to the accused were freely and voluntarily obtained.

Hira is associated with other State Counsel Latchmie Rahamat and Rhondel Weever and they are prosecuting 17-year-olds Christopher Dhanraj also known as Paul Jagnandan, Azim Khan, Vijay Rajkumar called Eon and Kumar Seeraj nicknamed ‘Boysie’.

The accused are being represented by Defence Counsel Hukumchand, for Khan; Kamini Parag for Rajkumar; Euclin Gomes for Jagnandan and Adrian Thompson for Seeraj.
The current smaller trial will resume on Tuesday.