Broken love affair led to Bowman’s murder

THE mixed jury at the Demerara Assizes where 19-year-old Samuel Cornelius is on trial for the murder of Anfernee Bowman heard that Bowman had been struck with ill-luck when his girlfriend had left him and had fallen in love with Cornelius.

Bowman, late student of the Guyana Education Trust College and a lessons class mate at a school in Aubrey Barker Street, South Ruimveldt, Georgetown, is said to have become enraged at the loss of his girlfriend to Cornelius.
The young men had been classmates and friends up to February 27, 2012, when Cornelius, threatened with harm by his new rival, had called on class mates to make peace among them.

One prosecution witness who testified yesterday before Judge Diana Insanally and the jury disclosed that the deceased and the accused had been good friends.
Under cross-examination by defence counsel Mr. Mark Waldron, the witness said the accused had told him that Bowman had plotted to beat him, and the accused had asked the witness to intervene.

But the witness admitted that he did not intervene. According to him, after leaving class that evening, he had passed on the road a group of persons that included Bowman and had said nothing to them.
Witness said the accused was later going home when he was attacked by a gang of men. Some witnesses denied this, but the resulting effect was that Bowman was fatally injured that night, receiving three stab wounds, one of which injured his heart.

The trial is continuing; and Mr. Mark Waldron is defending while Miss Natasha Backer is prosecuting.

(By George Barclay)