One of the policemen who investigated the murder of elderly Manchester couple Richard and Julia Lyn denied suggestions yesterday under cross-examination that the accused, Calvin Powell, did not take them to where the bodies were dumped.

Detective Sergeant Colin McKenzie, who was being cross-examined by defence lawyer Robert Armstrong who is representing Powell, said Powell was not forced to give a caution statement. He said Powell gave the statement of his own free will in the presence of attorney-at-law Owen Crosbie, who was representing him.

The Crown has led evidence at the trial in the Home Circuit Court that, on December 29, 2006, Powell showed the police where the bodies were at the Martin's Hill dump, New Green, Manchester. Evidence was also given that, on December 31, 2006, Powell said he had not killed the couple, but he wanted to tell the police what had happened.

Powell, 26, garbage-truck driver of New Green, and Lennox Swaby, 28, of Hopeton District, Manchester are charged with the double murder. The couple was strangled at their home between December 9 and 10, 2006.

Yesterday, Detective Deputy Superintendent Barrington Daley, who was present when the caution statement was given and also when Powell was questioned, said no one attached an electric cord to Powell, or to any chair on which Powell was sitting. He said Powell was not forced to sign any documents or threatened into cooperating with the police. He said no one tried to induce Powell into being a Crown witness. He said Crosbie was present when Powell gave the caution statement on December 31, 2006.

Wanted to speak

On December 29, 2006, he said he received information and went to the cell block at the Mandeville Police Station. He told Powell that he understood he wanted to speak with him and Powell said yes. Powell was taken to the conference room and said in the presence of other policemen that he had not slept for the last three nights because it rested on his brain and he wanted to take him to see the bodies. He said Powell took them to the dump and showed them the bodies, which were in a metal box.

Daley said that before the bodies were discovered, he questioned Swaby and Powell about the disappearance of the couple and the questions and answers were recorded.

barbara.gayle@gleanerjm.com