Crown seeks to prove Zamari McKay identity in Klansman gang murder case

Prosecutors on Tuesday renewed their attempt to prove the identity of a man whose body was discovered in a dump site off the Lakes Pen main road in St Catherine in 2022, during the ongoing trial of 25 alleged members of the Tesha Miller side of the Klansman gang.

The Crown says the dead man was Zamari McKay. It alleges that Carlos Williams, Jermaine Clarke and Owen Billings were involved in crimes connected to McKay, with the three accused named on counts 28 and 29 of the indictment for “knowingly facilitating” his robbery and killing.

The prosecution had run into difficulty a week earlier while leading evidence from its second witness on those counts. Defence attorneys objected to the way the Crown was questioning a police constable, forcing the court to halt that part of the testimony.

Through that officer, prosecutors had sought to outline events they say occurred before McKay disappeared and before his body was later found. The proposed evidence included several phone conversations the constable reportedly had with people who appeared to have some connection to McKay’s disappearance and death.

Defence lawyers repeatedly challenged the evidence. They argued, among other things, that the prosecutor was improperly prompting the witness and moving close to hearsay. They also questioned any attempt to rely on voice identification, saying the Crown had not first established the necessary basis and that the risk of unfair prejudice was greater than the usefulness of the material.

Justice Dale Palmer, who is hearing the case without a jury, refused the prosecution’s application at that stage. He said more groundwork had to be established before the evidence could be allowed, noting that he was being especially careful because the Crown had not yet led evidence proving McKay was dead.

The judge also made clear that he could only assess facts and witness statements once they were placed before him in court. After considering the possible prejudice to the accused men on those counts, he said he could not permit the Crown to get that evidence from the constable. He further observed that there was no evidence identifying the person with whom the witness had spoken on the call.

On Tuesday, the Crown called another witness, the lead investigator. The detective sergeant told the court that after receiving information on August 11, 2022, he went to Lakes Pen, where he found a male body lying face down in an illegal dumping area. He said the man’s feet were tied and the body had gunshot injuries.

The investigator testified that he accompanied morgue workers as the body was taken to Spanish Town Hospital. He said he later removed several items from the body, including a driver’s licence carrying McKay’s details and a Taxpayer Registration Number card. He also recovered an identification card and a bank card in another person’s name.

“The photograph on that driver’s licence matched the description of the deceased man,” the detective sergeant told the assistant director of public prosecutions who was leading the evidence.

He said the items were secured after they were packaged. The prosecution succeeded on Tuesday in having those documents and cards marked and accepted into evidence.

The lead investigator also told the court that he was present for McKay’s post-mortem examination, where a relative identified the body. He said he later took statements from several people who were close to McKay.

The detective sergeant further testified that information gathered during the investigation was passed to JamaicaEye, the national CCTV surveillance system. He said he was shown certain material and, based on that, applied for video to be extracted from the system’s archives. However, he told the court that the footage he requested was not provided to him.

The witness is expected to continue giving evidence at 10:00 am on Wednesday when the case resumes in the Home Circuit Division of the Supreme Court in downtown Kingston.