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Dec 09, 2018 Features / Columnists, Murder and Mystery
By Michael Jordan
If the man I spoke to a few years ago is correct, then there is someone out there who is stalking elderly men who live alone and killing them.
The man to whom I spoke believes that he has met this slippery individual before, and that he unwittingly helped a killer to escape death row once.
My informant believes that the man went on to kill again—and this time around, the victim was this informant’s own brother.
On Monday, January 12, 2004, the body of 55-year-old Social Impact Amelioration Programme (SIMAP) Executive Secretary, Lennox Stewart, was found in his Lot 112 Duncan Street, Newtown home.
He was lying face-down and his feet were bound with masking tape. A post mortem would later reveal that he was struck on the head with a blunt object and death was due to cerebral haemorrhage.
Stewart had lived alone and whoever had killed him had also ransacked his home and made off with a laptop computer and other valuables.
Neighbours told investigators that they had seen individuals transporting articles from the slain man’s home to a taxi. The eyewitnesses alleged that a male relative of Stewart’s was driving the car. Detectives subsequently detained a man who was allegedly seen putting a suitcase into the vehicle.
But their prime suspect turned out to be 22-year-old man, who was allegedly found with a cellular phone and other items belonging to Stewart.
Although the suspect insisted that Stewart had given him the items, he was eventually charged with Stewart’s murder. It would take some three years for the trial to begin.
During the High Court trial, prosecution witness Ronald Barkie testified that he saw a tall, dark-skinned man at the home carrying away things belonging to Stewart on the day that the SIMAP official’s body was found. However, this description of the alleged robber did not fit the accused.
The defence, led by Legal Aid Counsel Gary Best and Nigel Hawke, presented evidence to show that some of the items that the accused was found with had not belonged to the victim.
Defence attorney Best submitted that the prosecution had not made out a case against the accused.
In March 2007, Justice Yonette Cummings-Edwards ruled that the State had not made out a case against the accused. He was a free man. But before freeing him, the judge told him that if he had indeed murdered Stewart, he would have to live with the guilt for the rest of his life. According to her, every case has a silent witness who some refer to as “God” or the “Creator”.
She said He sees everything and only He knows what happened in the case.
And that should have been the last time that the public heard about the accused.
But then, some four years later, another pensioner died.
On January 19, 2011, a woman sent her son to check on her elderly next-door neighbour, 64-year-old Hector Fitzroy Marshall, who lived at Lot 362 Powis Close, South Ruimveldt.
She had become worried after she had not seen him sitting at his usual spot on his verandah. Mr. Marshall had also not answered her calls. A few minutes later, the woman’s son came running back to his mother. He claimed that Mr. Marshall was dead.
A close relative of Mr. Marshall recalled hurrying to the home and finding the elderly pensioner gagged and “tied up like a ‘guana” in a back bedroom of his home.
According to reports, the pensioner’s hands were bound behind his back with strips of cloth. His legs were also bound with strips of cloth, while another strip of cloth was strapped around his neck.
Death was due to strangulation.
Marshall was a former Personnel Officer of the Ministries of Information and Foreign Affairs. He was also a Programme Director of the Institute of Adult and Continuing Education.
Like Lennox Stewart, the slain SIMAP Executive Secretary, Marshall had lived alone.
The close relative who visited the scene suspects that the killer entered the pensioner’s home after removing some window panes. He believes that Mr. Marshall was out at the time and that the killer secreted himself in the house and waited for his victim to return.
Marshall’s home was completely ransacked, clearly pointing to robbery as a motive.
According to reports, the retired public servant had told close relatives that he had allowed his pension to accumulate over a four-year period. He’d planned to use this money to repair his house. But shortly before his death, Hector Marshall had collected his pension, including cheques from the National Insurance Scheme and from the post office.
Detectives began to focus their attention on a 29-year-old man who sometimes did odd-jobs for Mr. Marshall. It was the same man who was charged and later freed for Lennox Stewart’s murder. They located him several days after Mr. Marshall’s body was found. Detectives alleged that the suspect’s fingerprints were found on a gift box in the slain pensioner’s house. Mr. Marshall’s relative insists that the suspect was never allowed into the pensioner’s house.
Again, the man was charged for murder; and again, the case reached the High Court. But in July 2013, after a trial that lasted a little over a week, a 12-member jury returned with a verdict of not guilty.
He had once again walked out of the High Court a free man.
Hector Marshall’s relative blames ‘sloppy’ work by the police for causing the accused to be freed.
“The police case was sloppy; that why he was able to walk out of court,” he said.
“They made elementary mistakes; there was sloppy presentation of evidence.”
For instance, he said that the police failed to produce the music box, which allegedly had the fingerprints of the accused. He also claimed that on occasions, the police failed to turn up in court.
“At one time the police weren’t showing up, and one rank told me that I have to search for the police for them to give evidence. It was a sloppy investigation and the judge had no option than to direct the jury in a certain way. I was in the court every day, and the prosecutors did their best, but the prosecutors have to work with what they have.”
To add the proverbial salt into the wound, the relative claims that he had assisted the accused in hiring attorneys for his first murder trial.
“I feel terrible about that. He came out and quite possibly did the same thing.”
If you have any information about any other unusual case, please contact Kaieteur News at our Lot 24 Saffon Street, Charlestown location. We can be reached on telephone numbers 225-8458, 225-8465, 225-8491 or 225-8473. You need not disclose your identity.
You can also contact Michael Jordan on 645-2447, or via his email address: [email protected]
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