Bakr trial before year end

The trial of Jamaat-Al-Muslimeen leader Yaseen Abu Bakr on a charge of conspiracy to commit murder is expected to start before a High Court judge in November or December. The Cascade murder appeal of convicted killers Daniel Agard and Lester Pitman is also anticipated to be heard before the end of the year. Usually, high profile cases like these two are listed to be  heard soon after committal — as in the case of Abu Bakr, and sentencing, as in the cases of Agard and Pitman. A judiciary source confirmed yesterday that everything seems to be falling in place for these matters to be listed for hearing before the end of year.

On July 15 2004, Chief Magistrate Sherman McNicolls committed Bakr to stand trial on a charge of conspiracy to murder expelled Jamaat members Salim Rasheed and Zaki Aubaidah on June 4 2003, while Agard and Pitman were sentenced to hang by Justice Herbert Volney on July 14 2004, for the murders of Maggie Lee, John Cropper and Lynette Pearson, between December 10-14, 2001 at Mount Anne Drive, Second Avenue in Cascade. Bark, 63, is alleged to have hatched the conspiracy plot at Citrine Drive in Diamond Vale, Diego Martin. Rasheed was shot and injured outside the Movie Towne Complex on the night of June 4 2003, while Jilla Bowen was shot dead during the same incident.

British Queen’s Counsel Sir Timothy Cassel is expected to lead the prosecution’s team in the Bakr trial. Both Agard’s and Pitman’s appeals could find their way on the November list of the Court of Appeal. They will seek to gain their freedom by having their convictions quashed and sentences set aside, or at least have a retrial. If they fail in both bids, they will take their appeals to the Privy Council. The bodies of their three victims, Lee, 83, Cropper, 59, and Pearson, 51, were found with their throats slit in the bathroom of the master bedroom of their home.