Georgetown: Three were sentenced to 80 years imprisonment each for the 2012 murder of gold miner, Glen Xavier after a mixed 12-member jury Wednesday evening deliberated for hours, before delivering a unanimous guilty verdict.
Fizal Moore called “Hard Mouth’; Stephan Campbell, called “Burnham”; and Roy Yokum called “Ray Ray” were convicted for murdering Xavier at Cornbread Minimart, D’ Urban Street, Werk-en-Rust. Xavier is said to have been killed in the furtherance of a robbery on May 8, 2012. He died as a result of gunshot injuries.
As a result of the guilty verdict, Justice Navindra Singh imposed an 80-year sentence each on the trio when their three-week-long trial before him at the High Court in Georgetown came to an end.
State Prosecutors,Siand Dhurjon and Tuanna Hardy had called several witnesses during the trial to prove their case. Yokum was represented by George Thomas and Peter Hugh, while Campbell’s attorney was Maxwell McKay and Moore’s counsel was Trenton Lake.
On Monday the prosecution had closed its case, making way for the three men to lead their defence. All three accused elected to give unsworn statements. They each stood individually in the prisoner’s dock and gave their versions of the story, essentially claiming that they were innocent of the murder. The men contended that officers attached to the Major Crimes Unit of the Guyana Police Force had beaten them into signing caution statements, confessing to their involvement in Xavier’s murder when they were arrested on May 18, 2012 and taken to Police Headquarters in Eve Leary.
The trio also denied knowing each other before and pointed out in court that it was only after being charged with murder and imprisoned that they got acquainted with each other.
Last week, Police Detective, Rodwell Sarrabo testified that Campbell, called “Burnham”, had supplied investigators with a caution statement in which he told them that he had been on a robbery with his partners, but he never shot anyone. According to the statement, Campbell told detectives of a robbery plot.
In the statement, Campbell noted that he and his friends had travelled on motorcycles to commit the act. He said during the process of the robbery, ‘Hard Mouth’ (Fizal Moore) whipped out a gun and shot the man (Xavier).
“I didn’t kill da man, me and ‘Hard Mouth’ go pun the wuk…I didn’t know that ‘Hard Mouth’ woulda shoot the man.”
The accused also told police that ‘Hard Mouth’ got $90,000 and a cell phone from the robbery, but didn’t give him any of the loot.
Detective Sarrabo had also testified on the caution statement he had taken from Yokum. According to the Caution Statement (CS), which was admitted into evidence, the accused said that he did not kill Xavier but only “link up de wuk”.
The court had heard from the statement of Yokum saying that his friend “X” had told him of the two men he wanted to rob but he in turn informed “X” “ I don’t do crime right now.”
According to the statement, Yokum contacted “Hardmouth” and informed him about “de wuk” after which “Hardmouth” and “Burnham” left to execute the robbery.
Another police witness, , Detective Rodrick Melville had testified that Fizal Moore called ‘Hard Mouth,’ or ‘Winston Bostwick,’ had revealed to police investigators that there was a plot to rob gold miner Glen Xavier.
According to the Caution Statement (CS), which was admitted into evidence, the accused said that he was in Albouystown when he received a telephone call from his friend “Ray Ray.”
He said that “Ray Ray” told him about two men who had “a whole set of money” at a shop and he wanted help to go and rob them.He said that he met “Ray Ray” in D’Urban Street, where they joined “Burnham” and another man nicknamed “X”. Together, the accused told the police, he and his crew went down to the shop and proceeded to rob the men at the shop. But the accused said before they left the shop,” Burnham shoot up the shop wid the gun that he had to do the work.”
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