By Nagra Plunkett, Staff ReporterWESTERN BUREAU:
JURORS IN the manslaughter trial of Theodore 'Tappa' Whitmore will hear closing arguments from the prosecution and defence when the matter concludes today.
Justice Lloyd Hibbert adjourned the case yesterday afternoon, following an unsworn statement by the accused man from the prisoner's dock. President of the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF), Captain Horace Burrell, and other JFF officials accompanied Whitmore to the trial.
The national footballer maintained that he was not driving his 1993 Toyota Mark II car, registered 8170BX, on the night of January 28, 2001 when it crashed.
The accident claimed the life of his former teammate Stephen 'Shorty' Malcolm, when it hit an embankment and overturned on the Spring Hill main road in Trelawny. They, along with Charles Ewan, were returning from a friendly international game between Jamaica and Bulgaria at the National Stadium in which Malcolm had played.
He said that before their departure from Kingston, he asked Malcolm to drive because of an injury to his right leg. According to him, Malcolm told him he would when they left the Corporate Area, as he did not know the area well.
"When we were leaving the food place in Salem, St. Ann, 'Shorty' went in the car and started driving and I break back the seat in a lying position," Whitmore said.
He said he was later aroused by an expletive, which he repeated for the court, by Malcolm telling him that a tyre had blown out. He said the Mark II then hit something and started "flipping over".
Whitmore said that at no time did he tell the investigating officer, Sergeant Noel Grant, that he was the driver of the vehicle.
