Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter
A HIGH Court Judge has called on the authorities to consider carefully if 44-year-old building contractor Lincoln Williams was a proper person to be issued with a firearm.
Williams, of 10 Lord Nelson Drive, St. Andrew, was freed last week Friday of the murder of a man who was shot five times near an escalator in New Kingston in November 2004.
Mr. Justice Basil Reid made the call Wednesday when he addressed jurors who had complained to him that members of the public were raising queries about the verdict they had returned.
The judge advised them that their verdict was sacrosanct and could not be questioned.
Williams, who was represented by defence lawyers Frank Phipps, Q.C. and George Soutar, was freed last week Friday of the murder of 24-year-old Carlington Samuels, of Glengoffe, St. Catherine.
The judge said that Williams had said on his own admission in court that he discharged five bullets from a semi-automatic weapon at the deceased.
Witnesses for the Crown testified in the Home Circuit Court that Samuels had no weapon on him and his hands were raised when he was shot on November 16, 2004 near an escalator in the New Kingston Shopping Centre.
The judge stressed that it was only under cross-examination that Williams said Samuels grabbed at his licensed firearm which was at his waist and was covered by his shirt.
