She said, “I wanted more rum, husband wanted another woman”
JUSTICE Dawn Gregory, the trial judge in the voir dire (a trial within a trial) in the Jean Lacruz murder case, yesterday ruled that a caution statement in which murder accused Lacruz confessed to stabbing husband Samkarinan Singh, was given freely and voluntarily.
The accused had said that the statement was given involuntarily. As a consequence, the judge directed that the statement be admitted in evidence before the jury who will have to decide whether it was true.
Prosecutors in the matter are Miss Rhondel Weaver and Miss Teshana James. They will lead evidence through witnesses to prove that it was of her own free will that she gave the statement to the police.
According to the statement of Jean Lacruz, of 56 Vryheid’S Lust, East Coast Demerara, which had been read to the jury, the accused said that she had made the statement of her own free will.
The statement read, “Sir, this wha ah go tell you ah the truth. Yesterday, Wednesday 12th May 2006, Me bin a drink a half white rum home.  Me husband Sankarran Singh, buy the rum and he only took one shot of the rum, and ah drink the rest from the bottle.
“When the rum done, me and he had an argument because me da want more rum to drink and he na da want to bring any and me quarrel with he and he told me that he going and sex a lady at the back called Nancy.
“Me had a small knife in my hand and I got vex and me bore he on the chest with the knife and me bore he one more time on the left hand  and he fell down and me left and went and tell a bush lady named “Nicola”.
“Meh does work with she.
“He does beat me sir and he does drink plenty rum, me got one child for he, a three-month child. And when me work he does drink out my money which I keep to spend on the child. But me sorry me bore him,” the accused had said in a statement to the Police at the Sparendaam Police Station, the judge had ruled.
The hearing is continuing.