"They approached the room with the chicken lady daughter, with she little son. Bush tell NINO go by the next room to see if anybody coming out; while Bush and Earth held the woman under hostage and Bush held the little baby from making noise. Bush call me from watch manning to hold the baby and I held the baby. The two of them tie down the woman daughter and band up her mouth and hands. I hand over the baby to NINO and continued to watch manning and I went to another side to look out. Nino was rocking the baby from making noise and watching the mother. Curtis Marshall and Curtis Archibald kicked the door down and Earth shoot the man in his neck with a sawed off shotgun. The chicken lady remain in shock while Earth demanded money from the woman …"
"Earth then tell me to go and knock out the woman. I went and knock out the woman with sawed off gun butt in she head. Earth had sex with the two women and Bush had sex to. Earth ask me if I want a little this and I had sex with the chicken lady too. All this happen before I knock she out. Afterwards Bush and Earth brought the girl in the room with she mother and Earth tell me to go and knock out the girl and I went and did it with the gun. Earth then take brandy from the fridge and all ah we drink. Earth then say he going to burn down the house and I told him it didn't make sense. Earth say the woman see they face plain, so they have to burn down the house. We all had on mask but Earth and Nino take off their mask. Curtis Marshall and Bush went downstairs and brought up four tank of gas and rest them in the drawing room. Earth went downstairs and siphon gas from a van and began to sprinkle it in the drawing room and all about. Earth say the whole house have to burn so as to get no evidence. Earth light the house with matches and Nino and I walk downstairs and Nino had the baby and put it down on a blanket near the plucking area. We all leave the premises together and fire began to blaze … When I knock them out the two women didn't die they were just unconscious."
"Earth use to work by the Chicken Lady and Marlon to. They use to work over at the farm at Princes Town. It was around Christmas around New Years time. The plan was made around Christmas by Earth. He came and told us just so one night and me Earth Curtis Marshall Marlon and Nino went by the Chicken lady and they were drinking and having fun. They close up the house and we went in the yard and the crates were under the window. Earth climb up on the crates and went through the window and open the door for us. He had a home made shotgun and we went inside. Earth tie up the young girl with some cloth and then he kick down the door in the bedroom with the chicken lady and Marlon stab the man in his back and the knife bend. Earth then shoot the man in his neck with the shotgun. Marlon beat up the lady and ask she for the money and she say it in the bathroom. Earth search the bathroom and find the money in a pants. I do know what kind of pants. Marlon take the gun from Earth and beat the woman and the gun break. Marlon then had sex with the chicken lady and Earth bring de daughter and threw she in the room and she mother. Nino take up the baby and was holding it and I was stand up watching. Earth take jewels from on the people and Earth say he go burn dowm de house and he went downstairs and bring up real gas tank and put them in the house. He then take gas from dey car downstairs and sprinkle it in the house. Earth take matches from the house and light the house afire. We run out and Nino put de baby in the yard in a blanket. Earth take the money and jewels from the house and he make a big gold chain. Ah get$500.00 and Marlon take two big speakers and carry it. Ah really din do nothing is Earth who organise everything. Earth and Marlon put all the sponge in the room with the people to light it afire. Earth take curtain too and he is the last one to leave the place. After everything happen we went by Marlon and lime and then I went home. We did drink beer from the people fridge. Earth take a piece from the people house. Question: What you mean by a piece. Answer: Ah mean a gun a 22. Earth keep the gun and ah hear police hold him with it after. When the man start to bawl when Marlon stab him Earth shoot him with the home made and it had one shot. Question: what you mean by home-made. Answer: a home made shotgun. That gun was 'Biscuit' own and police held him with that too."
"Statement is voluntary. Court is satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that statement was given voluntarily. No credible evidence to support allegations of oppression, use of force, threat of force, promises or any other form of inducement, all of which allegations have been negatived by the prosecutor by evidence that the Court finds to be credible."
"Statement will be admitted in evidence. Accept evidence of Inspector Fredericks and Prison Officers O'Neil. I am satisfied there was no promise as alleged and that the statement was made voluntarily. I will not exclude for breach of the Judge's Rules because there was no Breach of such a nature as to justify exclusion."
"I now come to give you some directions on evidence of confessions, but before I do so, there is a direction that I consider pertinent on this very issue of circumstantial evidence, and it relates to a presumption of the criminal law. It is a very old presumption of the criminal law that has remained as strong as the courts. It is as old as the hills and the court has always recognised it, and it is that the suppression or destruction of pertinent evidence is deemed a prejudicial circumstance of great weight, for as no action of a rational being is performed without a motive, it naturally leads to the inference that such evidence, if it were produced, would operate unfavourably to the party in whose power it is to produce it and who withholds it or has wilfully deprived himself of the power of producing it. This direction is for your consideration in relation to the State's case, that a fire was deliberately set in a house in which there were three people, four actually, one of whom, on the State's case, was placed outside, and the other three left, and which fire consumed the bodies and the lives, if you accept the evidence of Dr Jankie, of Lalchan Sookoo, Shamiroon Ali-Bocal and also Nisha Ali-Wahab. Amongst the most forcible of presumptive indications that may be mentioned are all attempts to pollute or disturb the current of truth and justice by the concealment, suppression, destruction or alteration of any article of real evidence, any of which acts clearly brought home to the prisoner or his agents are of a most prejudicial effect as denoting on his part a consciousness of guilt and a desire to evade the pressure of facts tending to establish it. The presumption of criminality arising from concealment of death by the destruction or attempted destruction of human remains results from the act itself, rather than the means employed, however revolting, which means must be regarded as incidental to the fact of concealment and not as aggravating the character and tendency of the act itself. Thus the concealment of death under bizarre circumstances has always been considered to be a point of the greatest suspicion. This evidence, however, must be received by you with a certain degree of modification, especially here where it is that the concealment might be excited by the singular means adopted by the prisoner or prisoners. This point of evidence is for consideration by the jury as the judges of the facts, and it is accordingly for you to judge how far it is proof of the prisoners' guilt, each and every one of them."
"In this trial, I have admitted in evidence two written statements said to have been received under caution …"
"In the absence of any other explanation as to the source of that information which, in your adjudication, might be peculiar only to persons who were present, in the absence of any other explanation as to the source of that information, it will be open to you to find that that explanation is in relation to matters within the peculiar knowledge of the maker of that statement, and you would be entitled to act as such."
"Now, Members of the Jury, you would know from the statements which have been read, the written statements read to you, that what the accused are saying in relation to their respective statements, if you accept that they were given, and given freely by the accused, is that they went along with others to rob. They waited until it was safe to make an entry in the home of the deceased persons, and there and then they robbed. In the course of that execution of that plan, if you accept, for what it is worth, the statements made in those respective statements, in the presence of the maker of those statements, a shotgun, which was to their knowledge, their respective knowledge, as stated in their statements, carried along to the robbery to carry out the plan, if you so find that that is what happened; if you find that it was foreseeable, it was within the contemplation of anyone who went participating in that plan to rob, it was in their contemplation that that gun might have been used to kill or to cause grievous bodily harm to anybody in that house, whether it be through gunshots fired or by bashing in the head of a person with the butt of that gun, if there is evidence in that statement that that took place and you, the jury, adjudicate that that must have been within the contemplation that that could have happened, then, Members of the Jury, whomsoever participated in the execution of that unlawful joint enterprise would be equally guilty with the principal offender, that is to say, the person who did the act itself. That principal offender does not have to be identifiable. You do not have to find as a fact who the principal offender is, because sometimes the evidence does not allow you to identify the principal offender, and in this case, when you bear in mind my directions that the statement of one accused is not evidence against another accused, you will know by the process of thought that there is no evidence in this case by which you, the jury, can identify who the principal offender is. There is no evidence by which you can find who shot, who did anything to the women, apart from anybody who admits in their statement that they did anything to any of the persons in that house that night. And what you also have to consider, Members of the Jury, is whether in relation to that execution of that unlawful joint enterprise, if you find as a fact that it is admitted in the statement of either of the accused men, in relation to the case against him and him alone, whether it is that you, the jury, in view of what is stated in that statement, conclude that it was well within the contemplation of those participating there that some step of the nature of the setting of fire might have been taken in order to cover up their tracks, that is, the tracks of all the persons there, by destroying evidence which could have led to their detection, if you find, Members of the Jury, on the statement of either of those two accused, a basis by which you may conclude that the setting of that house, in the circumstances of this case as you find them to be, was well within the contemplation of those persons there, for reasons given in the statement, as for example, that he might have been seen, then, Members of the Jury, if it is that the burning took place in his presence and that person who gave that statement from which you find these findings of fact does nothing to dissociate himself from that act which you attribute or which you find was within the contemplation of the joint enterprise, he does nothing to dissociate himself, by either saying, 'Look, I am not in that. Leave me out of this. I am going out of this. I have nothing to do with this. I am going. You all don't do that. I am leaving you all. Don't count me in. I am against that,' if there is nothing to suggest that, Members of the Jury, then that person is liable to be found by you to have aided and abetted the catching of that fire itself, and to be liable for what that person must have and did foresee to have been or even might have been the result of fire being set to that house with those people in it. As such, he would be as liable for whatever happens as a result of that fire, as the person who put the fire, the flame itself, and would be equally liable to be convicted of murder if it is that you, the jury, in your judgment find as a fact that when that fire was set, it was set with the intention either to kill or to do serious bodily harm to the persons who were in that house when they were left there, which is a matter that you are entitled to find on the evidence. So that if a secondary party, on the evidence you find must have known, even might have known, it must have crossed his mind that that fire would have resulted in the death of those people, or would have burnt them so badly as to cause them serious bodily harm and he didn't dissociate himself with that act, he would be, as a secondary party, equally liable."
"It matters not, Members of the Jury, that you are unable, on the evidence, to find as a fact who actually set that fire. What matters is whether you are able to find that that fire was set in the presence of any of those four accused, and if so, whether at that time they, in relation to Accused Nos. 1 and 2, they were still participating in an unlawful joint enterprise, of which the setting of the fire, they would have foreseen or contemplated to be an incident of the execution of that unlawful joint enterprise. If you so find, Members of the Jury, and you find that neither Accused No. 1 nor 2 dissociated himself from the setting of the fire, if you find that they were there, and you adjudicate in your judgment, by the process of thought, having considered all the evidence, that it must have crossed their minds that that fire, when set in their presence and to their knowledge, might -- it does not have to go so far as would have -- but might have caused serious bodily injury to any person who was left in that house, who was not rescued from that house, or that that fire so set in their presence might have consumed and killed anybody, any human being left there, and with that knowledge they did nothing to prevent it, then, Members of the Jury, it is open to you to find that they aided and abetted the setting of that fire in that house on that day, and also, Members of the Jury, would be as liable to be convicted of any offence which arose as a result of the setting of that fire."
"Presence at the scene of a crime may or may not found criminal culpability. A person who comes upon a crime scene accidentally cannot, in the absence of some evidence of participation, be liable as a principal or secondary party. It is the general rule of the criminal law in the case of principals in the second degree, that there must be participation in the act, and that although a man is present whilst an offence is being committed, if he takes no part in it and does not act in concert with those who commit to it, he will not be a principal in the second degree merely because he does not endeavour to prevent it or apprehend the perpetrator of the crime. To make an abettor to a murder or homicide a principal to its commission, there are regularly two things requisite. Firstly, he must be present and, secondly, he must be aiding and abetting. Note that principals in the first degree are those by whom the death wound is inflicted. Principals in the second degree are those who are present when the death wound is given, aiding and abetting, comforting and assisting the persons actually engaged in the homicidal act. Mere presence alone will not be sufficient to make a party an aider and abettor, but it is essential that he should, by his countenance and conduct in the proceeding, being present, aid the principal if he is to be culpable. If either of the accused sustained the principal by his presence, or if you find as a fact a bodily presence there for the purpose of encouraging and forwarding the unlawful conduct of a principal, even without doing more when the flame was lighted, and was by that presence assisting and encouraging the principal in the unlawful conduct, that would be cogent evidence of guilt of the offence imputed by the indictment. Thus, while bodily presence is critical on the facts of this case, what matters most is knowledge of the principal offence, the ability to control the action of the principal offender, and the deliberate decision to refrain from doing so. If then you find, Members of the Jury, that any one or more individual accused had the knowledge that fire was being deliberately set to the body of Lalchan Sookoo, of Shamiroon Ali-Bocal or of Nisha Ali Wahab or to the surroundings where those bodies were, with a basic human knowledge that fire destroys, kills or seriously injures, either with an accompanying intention to conceal the commission of a crime already committed by the destruction of evidence or with the intention to kill or cause serious bodily harm, then it will be open to you to find, in relation to any given count on the indictment to which it relates that that accused positively encouraged the commission of the offence. Mind you, encouragement does not of necessity amount to aiding and abetting. It may be intentional or unintentional. A man may unwittingly encourage another, in fact, by his presence, his silence or non-interference, or he may encourage intentionally by expression, gestures or actions, or even presence coupled with any of those intended to signify approval. In the latter case, he aids and abets; in the former, he does not. It is no criminal offence to stand by, a mere passive observer of a crime, even of a murder. Non-interference to prevent a crime is not itself a crime. But the fact that a person was voluntarily and purposely present, witnessing the commission of a crime and offered no opposition to it, although he might reasonably be expected to prevent its commission and had the powers so to do, or at least to express his dissent or even walk away as an unequivocal act of his dissociation with that unlawful conduct might, under some circumstances, afford cogent evidence upon which you, the jury, would be justified in finding that such a bodily present person wilfully encouraged and so aided and abetted the commission of the crime. That would be purely a question of fact for you, the Members of the Jury."
"Do you find that the effect of the responses said to have been made by Accused No. 3 was to accept the truth of the accusation? Did he thereby acknowledge the truth of the facts by which he was confronted? If you find that he was admitting a presence, this will be evidence which you may properly consider in the context of the forensic evidence derived from the scene of the crime. Did he acknowledge an involvement in the killings, but denied killing anyone? Did he acknowledge the presence of at least two other persons whom he named as also being there present, and who in his own knowing, burned down the house? Did he, in the context of that scene, save the baby by putting it outside? And if so, is he acknowledging by so doing an understanding in his own mind that the baby might have perished if not removed to safe haven outside? Might he not have realised that harm might have also befallen one or more or even all of the deceased if they too were not also taken outside? Was he in a position to do something to prevent other persons there present from burning in the house, knowing full well that the deceased might have perished in the flames? Or, did he have knowledge that persons were already, to his mind, killed or hurt by others and the house to his knowledge being burned in order to conceal the crime by destruction of evidence?"