Adidja Vybz Kartel Palmer and co-accused faced another intense week of trial for the alleged murder of Clive Lizard Williams.
The trial will resume again next Monday at the Home Circuit Court in downtown Kingston, Jamaica.
Following Clive Lizard Williams’ sister and former girlfriend depositions, this past Tuesday the prosecution introduced their star witness, Lamar Chow.
Lamar Chow was the man who allegedly escaped from Vybz Kartel’s house on August 16, 2011 and the one that reported the men to the police.
Under question from lead prosecutor Jeremy Taylor, Chow told the court about his version of the incident leading up to the disappearance of his friend Clive Williams.
Chow released a shocking testimony where he described his memory of the night.He told the court that the whole ordeal was over a missing firearm. He said Vybz Kartel and the co-accused himself and Williams were all in the house in Havendale, St. Andrew.
Chow said Shawn “Storm” Campbell accompanied them in a taxi to the home where Vybz Kartel invited them inside and began questioning them about some missing firearms.
Chow said he and Williams told the men that they were planning to buy back the guns that went missing. However, despite their plea, he said Kahira Jones held on to Williams from behind whilehe was able to run away somewhere in the house but Vybz Kartel and Shawn Storm went looking for him.
Chow told the court that the two man brought him back into the living room where he noticed Clive Williams was laying on the ground motionless and Kahira Jones had a building block in his hand.
He said he was in fear of his life and managed to get away from the men and ran. The witness said Vybz Kartel was chasing him and was bitten by a dog that was in the yard.
By this time the jury was listening attentively to every detail of his testimony. Chow was shaking and surrounded and protected by more than 10 police officers.
VYBZ KARTEL ‘MOTHER’S LOVE’ SO UNIQUE RECORDS JULY 2013
Lamar Chow said he and Vybz Kartel the same night shared a cab to the hospital before returning to the Waterford community in Portmore.
Chow said he was told by Shawn “Storm” Campbell that he should not tell anyone about what happened to Clive Williams. However, he said he told everyone who asked him.
Yesterday things got turned around when a defense attorney in the Vybz Kartel’s trial suggested that the prosecution’s main witness “sold” the accused men for “30 pieces of silver” like Jesus was, concocting a story of murder to avoid picking up a gun charge.
The witness was being cross-examined by Pierre Rogers, the attorney for Kahira Jones, who — along with Kartel, Shawn ‘Shawn Storm’ Campbell, André St John and Shane Williams — is being tried in the Home Circuit Court for the August 16, 2011 alleged murder of Clive ‘Lizard’ Williams in a house in Havendale, St Andrew.
During the cross-examination, Rogers repeatedly accused the witness — who testified with his head hung in an apparent bid to avoid eye contact with the accused men — of being a liar. He denied that the police assisted him with the making of his statement. Still, Rogers at one point told the witness: “Mr I hate to do this but you, sir, are a liar.” .
Rogers’reference to the witness as selling the accused men for “30 pieces of silver” followed the witness saying that he was not charged with illegal possession of firearm despite telling the police that he had buried a gun in his yard in Waterford, St Catherine after August 16.
Asked by Justice Lennox Campbell if the gun was recovered, the witness said ‘no’. That question triggered the following exchange between Rogers and the witness: Rogers: “Did you carry the police to look for [the gun]?” Witness: “They know where it was.” Rogers: “You carry them to look?” Witness: “No, sir.” Rogers: “What did you have to tell the police why they didn’t charge you?” “Sir?” the witness said, as if he didn’t understand.
“Forgive me,” Rogers said. “That was unforensic. You spoke to the police before they decided not to charge you?” “I don’t understand,” said the witness to several grunts of apparent frustration from Rogers, whose next question was: “You know about the 12 pieces of silver Jesus was sold for?” to which the witness said “yes”.
Rogers was corrected by Campbell, who told him that Jesus was actually sold for 30 pieces of silver, which sparked laughter as the witness, decked in a white shirt and tattoos running down his left arm and on his fingers, stood with his head bowed, awaiting the next question. “Did you receive any favour, any 30 pieces of silver for your story?” Rogers asked. “No sir,” the witness said. “But they didn’t charge you,” Rogers said. “They never found [the gun],” the witness said.
Rogers then suggested to the witness that the police assisted him in making up a story against the men and that was why he wasn’t charged for the gun he had buried, but the witness denied the suggestion.
At another point during the cross-examination, Rogers pointed out some contradiction between the witness’s evidence and that given earlier by the sister of the deceased — which include the time of the day he said he and the deceased ran to her yard on August 14, what she was wearing at the time and the amount of money she said she gave them both.
