Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter

A jury, after deliberating for more than five hours yesterday, failed to arrive at a unanimous verdict at the murder trial of 59-year-old People's National Party (PNP) activist Tony Welsh.

Justice Marjorie Cole-Smith ordered a retrial for Welsh, who is charged with the murder of 22-year-old Damion Hussey, of Golden Spring, St. Andrew.

The judge asked the foreman of the jury if they needed any further assistance, but he said it was not his impression that they would come to an agreement.

"We have toiled in the vineyard but it is not to a time for reaping," K.D. Knight, Q.C., one of Welsh's five lawyers remarked.

Welsh has been in custody since he was arrested in February following intensive investigations by Operation Kingfish. He will be taken to court on Friday when his lawyers will make a bail application.

The Crown, represented by Stephanie Jackson-Haisley, Dirk Harrison and Jeremy Taylor, Crown Counsel, led evidence at the trial which began on October 9 that Hussey was fatally stabbed in his yard at Golden Spring on January 15.

Witnesses

Several witnesses testified in the Home Circuit Court that they saw Welsh, a Rastafarian and other men in Hussey's yard. One witness said that, when she peeped around the corner of the house, she saw Welsh, who she knew before, stabbing Hussey in the chest.

It was reported that Hussey was stabbed when men in a bus with supporters returning from a presidential rally for Dr. Peter Phillips was stoned. Men alighted from the bus to enquire who stoned the bus and Hussey was stabbed when he came out of his house to find out why people were in his yard.

Welsh said in an unsworn statement that he was not in Golden Spring at the time of the incident.