(Trinidad Express) Phillip “The Boss” Boodram, the reputed drug lord who was freed from prison in June after 17 years on the charge that he was involved kidnapping and burying alive a businesswoman, has been shot and killed by police.
Boodram died yesterday afternoon in an alleged shootout with police officers not far from his family home at Dow Village, California.
At least two other men were also shot by police, who say that several guns were recovered from the vehicle in which the men were occupants.
Police officers have cordoned off the road leading the Pt Lisas campus of the University of Trinidad and Tobago, while the scene of the shooting is processed.
In June, Appellate Judges Alice Yorke-Soo Hon, Mark Mohammed and Prakash Moosai upheld an appeal from Boodram, Roger Mootoo, Ricky Singh, Kervin Williams, and Aaron “Arc Eye” Grappie, regarding their manslaughter conviction and the 28-year-sentence they received.
It was due to several errors made by the High Court Judge who had presided over their second retrial in 2016.
“In our view, given the serious nature of the errors made by the trial judge, the multiple material irregularities identified, along with the fact that the fairness of the trial was severely compromised due to the adverse publicity during the course of the trial, combined with the issues surrounding the evidence of the prosecution’s main witness, Roderique, our hands are tied and we have no alternative but to allow this appeal” Justice Yorke-Soo Hon stated.
The Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions was given the opportunity to consider whether it wanted to pursue a third retrial, but Deputy DPP Joan Honare-Paul informed the court that a retrial was not being pursued.
The men were discharged.
They had first been accused of murdering Samdaye Rampersad who was kidnapped while standing in front of her home in Petit Bourg, San Juan in November, 2005.
Her body was found more than a month later in a shallow grave in a cashew field in Carolina Village, Claxton Bay.
An autopsy showed she died of asphyxia and suffocation consistent with being buried alive.
