Klansman Trial: Prosecution Introduces Two Police Witnesses

New faces have been introduced to the one don Klansman trial, as the Prosecution’s third and fourth witnesses who are members of the police force took the stand on Tuesday, November 23. The witnesses, both female detectives, detailed how they listened and transcribed phone conversations between alleged gang members.

The prosecution’s third and fourth witnesses in the one don Klansman trial both appeared physically in court to testify against the alleged gang leader Andre Blackman Bryan and 32 of his co-accused. Both are current serving members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force, (JCF).

The two police witnesses detailed how they sat separately with the second witness to transcribe telephone conversations and WhatsApp voice notes. The second witness, who was a top-tier member of the gang, previously indicated that while cooperating with the police, he received phones to secretly record conversations he had at the time with alleged members of the gang.

The first police witness, who met the informant in September 2019, said it took her more than a year to complete transcribing two sets of recordings from a compact disc.

She noted that the informant identified the voices on the recordings by name, she says one transcript had 174 pages and the other had 69. The prosecution sought to admit both transcripts and the compact disc into evidence, but the defense objected to its content.

Contesting, there was no evidence to suggest the content was kept safe and that there was insufficient evidence to identify the voices on the recordings. In one instance the defense questioned the whereabouts of the cell phones used to record these conversations as well as the origin of the compact disc and the chain of custody.

Chief Justice Bryan Sykes intervened, ruling that the prosecution would need to submit further evidence before the materials can be admitted as evidence; they were however marked for identity.

The second police witness also went through a similar process with the informant, transcribing recordings for over a month which started in February 2019. She is expected to continue giving evidence when court resumes on Wednesday, November 24 at 10 am.

More in this CVM Live story from Robian Williams: