COME next Tuesday, Justice Jo-Ann Barlow is expected to sum up the evidence in the retrial of Lennox Wayne, called ‘Two Colours,’ who is accused of murdering cosmetologist Ashmini Harriram.
Wayne is currently on trial at the Demerara High Court for the capital offence of murder. He has denied that, on July 10, 2014, at Lusignan Railway Embankment, East Coast Demerara (ECD), he murdered Harriram.
The accused is represented by attorneys-at-law Ronald Daniels, Kiswana Jefford and Edriana Stephens, while prosecutors Lisa Cave and Latifah Elliot will present the state’s case.
On Thursday, the defence and the prosecution made their closing arguments. Justice Barlow then set July 28 as the date she will sum up the evidence.
Following the summing up on Tuesday, the judge will hand over the case to the 12-member jury for consideration of the verdict.
The murder case was first tried in 2017 before Justice Jo-Ann Barlow and a 12-member jury at the Georgetown High Court, but ended in a hung jury.
Justice Barlow subsequently ordered a retrial, and the matter was listed to be heard during the January 2021 session of the Demerara Assizes.
The case later came up before Justice Sandil Kissoon and was sent for retrial after the jury also failed to arrive at a verdict.
In April 2021, Wayne’s co-accused, Melroy Doris, had pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to five years.
The Guyana Chronicle had reported that Wayne was allegedly the triggerman, while Doris was the taxi driver who drove Wayne to the scene of the crime to execute Harriram.
It is also alleged that following the act, Doris reportedly transported Wayne back to the city where the victim’s phone was handed over to one of the two persons who had contracted the duo to carry out the murderous act for a price tag of $2.5 million.
The two men were reportedly contracted by the brother-in-law of the hairdresser and an accomplice who wanted her dead, after they suspected that she had disclosed concealed information about them.
They reportedly believed that it was she who had informed the police of a drug operation in which they were engaged, resulting in the narcotics being seized.
