Three years after his first trial ended in a hung jury, murder accused Rondell Bacchus appeared before Justice Priya Sewnarine-Beharry yesterday for the commencement of his retrial into the 2008 murder of scrap iron dealer Akbar Alli.
In 2013, Bacchus was charged along with Andrew Morris, with the murder of Alli. The duo had allegedly used a gun to rob the wife of the deceased, Bibi Rameena Hydar Alli, of $2.1 million and fatally shot her husband in the process.
The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) had subsequently withdrawn the charge against Morris due to the lack of evidence.
Throughout the better part yesterday’s proceedings, Defence Counsel Nigel Hughes made attempts to poke holes in the prosecution’s case that Bacchus was positively identified during a police identification parade.
Called to testify in this regard was Trevor Oswald, the former senior rank of the Guyana Police Force who carried out the ID parade. Oswald told the court that he was given instructions to include the accused in an ID parade in relation to the murder of Akbar Alli.
With these instructions in mind, Oswald stated, he met the accused in the parade room at the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and told him that it was required that he be a part of the ID parade. Oswald said the accused did not object and was subsequently identified by the dead man’s wife Bibi Rameena Hydar-Alli.
Under cross-examination by Hughes, the former police officer explained that the line of individuals in the parade had included Bacchus and six other men who he said were rounded up from the Stabroek Market area.
Essentially, when questioned about how the selection was done, Oswald explained that the six men were selected on the basis of the clothes they wore and their race as given in the description of the suspect supplied to the police.
Oswald accepted that while he had told the Magistrate’s Court that Bacchus had objected to being a part of the ID parade, he is now changing his statement to reflect that the accused did not object to it.
Also called upon to give evidence were Detective Sergeant Lillian Scotland and former GPF officer Sidney Charles.
In her evidence-in-chief, Scotland attested to witnessing a fragment of metal suspected to be a bullet being removed from Alli’s body during the post-mortem examination conducted by State Pathologist Dr Nehaul Singh.
She explained that after it was removed from the body, she took possession of the fragment and transported it to the Ballistics Department of CID where it was taken to be tested and subsequently to the Alberttown Police station where it was lodged as evidence.
Meanwhile, Charles explained that on the day of the incident, he in the company of others visited the murder scene and observed what appeared to be blood stains.
He said several persons were questioned before he headed to the Georgetown Public Hospital where he saw Alli’s lifeless body. Charles went on to say that at that time, he noticed a gunshot wound to Alli’s neck.
The trial is expected to continue today with the testimony of three witnesses including Ali’s wife Bibi Rameena Hydar-Ali, who witnessed the murder, and Dr Nehaul Singh.
The state’s case is being presented by Prosecutor Tuana Hardy in association with Narissa Leander.
