Lawyer Melville guilty of trying to kill secretary

A jury yesterday found attorney Joseph Melville guilty of the attempted murder of his legal secretary Patricia Cox. Co-accused “PH” driver Hilton Winchester was also found guilty  on a four count indictment of conspiracy to murder Cox, attempted murder, kidnapping and assaulting her occasioning a wound. They were remanded in custody and will be sentenced on Monday by Justice Melville Baird. There was an eerie silence in the packed courtroom as the foreman delivered the guilty verdict on all four counts for each accused. Melville turned to the public gallery and shook his shoulders to friends and relatives after the verdicts. He bent his head and the smile and gestures he had moments before disappeared.

Cox, who appeared pensive throughout the trial, burst out laughing as she returned to the witness room and the protective custody of the police. She declined to talk to the media but was smiling.   The jury of three men and six women took two hours before returning its verdict of guilty on all counts. In pleas of mitigation, Melville’s attorney Nathaniel King, and Winchester’s attorney, Thomas Cunningham, asked the court to temper justice with mercy and to exercise leniency. King, assisted by Ken Sagar,  said that Melville who was 47 years old and a father of two children who has thrown himself completely at the mercy of the court.

Cunningham said his client is 24, and without a formal education. He said the circumstances in which Winchester had found himself before the court is such that he himself, is finding it difficult to accept. Senior State prosecutor Trevor Ward and prosecutor George Busby made no comments or replies to the prisoners pleas in mitigation. Melville, an attorney since 1995, and Winchester, who drives his private car as a taxi, were before the Port-of-Spain First Criminal Court answering to the four count indictments which started about February 2, 2004.  The fact of the case was that Melville had hired Jason Holder and Ainsley Alleyne to kill Cox, because Melville feared that Cox was selling him out to the police — the Fraud Squad in particular. The hitmen wanted a getaway car and a driver, so they recruited Winchester. Winchester knew what the job was and accepted because of the promise of receiving “big money.”

Cox was deceived into believing that she was going with Holder to get a legal statement for someone her boss, Melville, was representing in a murder case. Melville himself encouraged Cox to get into the car with Holder. She was taken to Cumberland Hill, where the men attempted to kill her but she escaped. Cox spent the night hiding in a hole in the forest and the following day, assisted by a couple, she made her way  to the St James Police Station. Alleyne, 26, of St James, had turned State witness, testified at the preliminary inquiry but was murdered late last year. Holder cannot be found.