Verdict today in Carnival Monday murder trial

MURRAY JOSEPH  FORDE, accused in the Carnival Monday murder trial, will know his fate today after Justice Prakash Moosai completes summing up the case, and the jury retires to deliberate for a verdict. Yesterday, Moosai began summing up the case to the 12-member mixed jury, which heard over the last eight weeks in the San Fernando First Assize Court, how Forde, 42, a labourer of Teak Village, Shell Settlement Rio Claro, killed Annette Sawh. The woman disappeared on a Carnival Monday (February 11, 2002) while on her way to work as a domestic servant.  Forde allegedly stabbed Sawh 20 times in her stomach and neck with a sharpened spoon.

The State’s case, led by Assistant Director of  Public Prosecutions, Joan Honore Paul, is that Forde sharpened a spoon and stabbed Sawh. The woman lived at Nohar Road in Tableland and, according to the State’s case, she disappeared on J’ouvert morning 2002. She was last seen walking along the Naparima Mayaro Road, Tableland, towards her employer’s house at San Pedro Village. Sawh’s body was found near a ravine in a cocoa estate at Nohar Road on Ash Wednesday — February 13, 2002. It bore multiple stab wounds. The State’s case alleged that Forde confessed to the killing. Moosai began summing up the case on yesterday, and will continue today.