By George Barclay
GUYANA Defence Force (GDF) instructors Christopher Harmon and Kurt Trotman, who were committed to stand jury trial for the murder of Cadet Officer Amar Rajkumar, were freed by a High Court judge yesterday.

They had been accused of unlawfully killing the victim during a training session at Base Camp Stephenson, Timehri, on April 11, 2006 and the magistrate, who presided at the preliminary inquiry (PI), held that a case had been made out against the accused.

But the prisoners, through attorney-at-law Mr. Joseph Harmon, applied for an order or rule nisi of certiorari to quash the committal and command the magistrate to show cause why the applicants should not be released from custody.

Justice Jainarayan Singh, who had previously granted the nisi order, yesterday made it absolute, after ruling that there was no case for the duo to answer.

Seventeen witnesses, including 14 cadet officers who were undergoing the same course as Rajkumar, had testified at the PI.

According to the judge, it was conceded that there was no direct evidence that either of the applicants laid a hand on the deceased and, therefore, the magistrate’s decision, in finding that a prima facie case of murder had been established was based on circumstantial evidence alone.

In the affidavit in answer, the magistrate relied on the testimony of one witness who said he could not remember seeing accused Trotman at the Food Hall when it was discovered that Rajkumar was missing.

The judge said: “In my view, this was not circumstantial evidence of any great import and could not, by itself, be relied on to establish a prima facie case of murder.

“There was evidence from several of the witnesses who testified that the deceased, in attempting to roll a tyre up a hill, which was an exercise for all the cadet officers, had fallen and rolled down the hill and was seen breathing heavily and frothing from the mouth, thereafter.

“The evidence of Dr. Nehaul Singh, the forensic pathologist, did not further the case for the Prosecution. He concluded that the blow to the head which resulted in the death of Rajkumar could have been sustained in the course of his rolling down the hill.

“Further, he gave evidence that, after a blow of that nature, death could have occurred between one and 24 hours thereafter.

“The Court, therefore, could not ascertain, with any degree of certainty, when the victim sustained the injury that caused death. It was, therefore, impossible for the magistrate to conclude that he sustained his injury at the time when Trotman was not present in the Food Hall.

“There was no other evidence from any of the 17 witnesses which connected the two accused to the injury suffered by the victim which, subsequently, resulted in his death. There were several co-existant possibilities as to how he sustained his injury, the most viable of which was that it occurred while he was rolling down the hill which was cluttered with steel obstacles and trees,” the judge reasoned.

He continued: “But we are not here to conjecture as to how Rajkumar died but to decide if there is a sufficiency of evidence to commit the two applicants to the High Court for the offence of murder.

“I feel that there is no such evidence, direct nor circumstantial,” Justice Singh said as he discharged the accused who had been incarcerated for nearly two years.