-court told
Eon Norton was on Tuesday remanded to prison when he appeared at the Georgetown Magistrate’s Court charged with being the caretaker who allegedly burgled several rooms in the apartment building where he was employed.
The twenty-three-year-old man of Hadfield Street pleaded not guilty to the charge of simple larceny when Acting Chief Magistrate Melissa Robertson read it to him.
He denied that on May 23, he stole US$1,200, equivalent to $240,000 Guyana currency, the property of Femmy Steele.
Norton, in is own defence, stated that he is the caretaker of the apartment where Steele and his girlfriend currently live.
He said that the missing money allegation came about as a result of him going into Steele’s room.
He noted that it was his duty to go into all of the rooms in the apartment building to do chores such as checking to see if all the stoves had been turned off.
He said that a bed in another room needed changing and in order to do so he needed to take one from Steele’s room and he did so.
He said that he did not seek the permission of Steele to enter his room since he was not at home, so he pulled the bed out and locked the room afterwards.
He said that when Steele got home he soon called in the police and accused him of stealing a quantity of cash that he had in the room.
He said that Steele informed the police that the money went missing three weeks before this incident.
However, Steele noted that he had proof that Norton had burgled his room.
He said that on the day in question he secured the room and went out but soon returned and found several items placed differently from the way he had left them.
He said that he then checked the front room where he left the money and discovered that it was missing. He noted that he did not raise an alarm then but just set a surveillance camera in the room and left. He said that when he returned and checked the surveillance camera it had recorded that several minutes after he left, Steele went back into the room and rummaged through his things.
“My worship he searched my wardrobe, my drawers, in my bathroom, he even stole my cheese out of the fridge.”
He said that when he informed the owner of the apartment of the incident, he was told that Norton was not supposed to have an extra key to his room and the bed should have been removed for his room three weeks earlier.
The police were called in and a search was conducted in Norton’s room where the key to Steele’s room and several others were recovered.
Norton was then arrested and charged with the offence.
The magistrate refused bail for Norton when he suggested it and ordered that he return to court on June 15.
