Barbara Gayle, Staff ReporterLAWYERS REPRESENTING 42-year-old reputed gang leader Joel Andem are opposing the decision taken by the director of public prosecutions (DPP) to try him with two other men for murder.
Andem is to be tried with co-accused 44-year-old businessman Rupert Wallace of Garveymeade, Portmore, St. Catherine and 24-year-old labourer, Rohan Masters, of 66 Luke Lane, Kingston, for the murder of 48-year-old gas station operator Sylvia Edwards.
REMANDED IN CUSTODY
The men appeared in the Home Circuit Court yesterday and were remanded in custody to return to court on March 16 when Andem's lawyers will apply for a separate trial.
The other two men are unrepresented but they told Mr. Justice Basil Reid that they will have legal representation when they return to court.
Senior Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions Paula Llewellyn said yesterday that from the statements on the file, there were allegations of common design to kill Mrs. Edwards in respect of all three men.
Mrs. Edwards, who lived in Plantation Heights, St. Andrew, was kidnapped along Red Hills Road, St. Andrew, in July 2000. When a demand for a ransom of $200,000 was not met, she was shot dead and buried in a shallow grave in Constitution Hill, St. Andrew.
CONVICTED
Wallace and Masters, and 32-year-old craft vendor Howard Lindsay were convicted of the murder. They appealed and in December last year, the Court of Appeal freed Lindsay and sent back the case of the other two men for retrial.
Andem was on the police most wanted list until he was captured in Clarksonville, St. Ann, in May last year.
Berthan Macaulay, Q.C., and attorneys-at-law Janet Nosworthy and Lloyd Shackleford are representing Andem.
