While there was talk Thursday of a verdict coming down by the end of the night, jurors spent about four hours in the deliberation room without reaching a decision in the murder retrial of Jahlil Ward and broke for the evening around 7:30 p.m. to pick up again early Friday morning.
Ward was convicted last October of stabbing to death James "Jamie" Cockayne on St. John during the early morning hours of June 19, 2007, but was recently granted a new trial after a judge found the government had withheld evidence that Ward’s attorney, Michael Quinn, has said could have exonerated his client.
That evidence is a statement made by Kamal Thomas, a former co-defendant of Ward’s that allegedly confessed to a prison cellmate that he killed Cockaye. At the time the alleged confession was made, Ward was a detainee of the Bureau of Corrections on St. Thomas, awaiting trial on charges that he and St. John resident Anselmo Boston had assaulted Cockayne before he was murdered, ultimately playing a part in his eventual death.
During closing arguments Thursday, government attorney Claude Walker said that Thomas and Boston did fight with Cockayne that night, and highlighted testimony given over the past few days stating that Boston had even hit Cockayne with a pool stick before the two were kicked out of the Front Yard Bar in Cruz Bay a few hours before the murder. As Cockayne was leaving, Thomas and Boston, toting sticks, gave chase and pursued Cockayne up the hill.
The fight was broken up a bit later, after a nearby resident saw what was going on and began honking her horn. Thomas and Boston came back, and Cockayne, at that point, was still alive, Walker said.
But there was another man in the bar that night, he added, saying that Ward had spotted Cockayne and targeted him because he was white, was "buff like a football player" and had money. He went along with Boston and Thomas as they chased Cockayne, but when the fight got broken up and the other two came back, Ward kept going, following Cockayne to an area near the Fashion Palace, where Ward attempted to rob him, Walker said.
But Cockayne fought back, he added.
"He was a brave person, right to the end," Walker said. "And I’m asking you, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, to be brave just like Jamie, to look at the defendant and find him guilty."
The government’s argument was rooted in the statements of three witnesses — two that have said Ward confessed to them about killing Cockayne and a third, St. John resident Glanville "Shark" Frazer, who said that Ward knocked on his door shortly after the murder and demanded a ride, saying that he had "just fought a white guy" and needed to go home.
Frazer has said he noticed that morning that Ward’s white sneakers were splattered with blood, which Walker said corroborated testimony given earlier by an officer at the scene, who said there was so much blood coming from Cockayne that it "ran down the street."
Walker said Thursday the testimony came from people that had known Ward his whole life—friends, a former girlfriend and a god brother, who all had no reason to lie.
But Quinn countered in his closing argument Thursday that all these witnesses had some tie to Thomas and had only shown up on the government’s radar after David Jackson, an investigator from the territorial Public Defender’s Office working on Thomas’ case, said he had information that could clear Thomas of the crime.
"These people didn’t wind up here because the government’s investigation turned them up," Quinn said. "They got here because someone brought them forward to get themselves off the hook."
Speaking for an hour and a half, Quinn tore apart most of the government’s witness statements, saying the only credible testimony in the case came from two eyewitnesses who both said they saw a man — whose face they did not see — dressed in dark clothing running away from the scene and down the street to a parked car, where another man was already waiting. Witnesses said they drove off together, which would cancel out Frazer’s testimony about Ward showing up at his door, going inside and asking for a ride, Quinn said.
He told jurors that if they used "logic" and "common sense," they would find the flaws and inconsistencies in other key witness statements.
Quinn also spoke about several government bungles in the case, beginning with a failure to secure the crime scene and ending with the prosecution’s failure to turn over Thomas’ confession, which Quinn said violated "Mr. Ward’s constitutional rights."
Quinn also questioned the credibility of government witness Clayton Boyce, an inmate who testified that Thomas had only talked with his cellmate about being accused of murder and that Boyce had never heard Thomas confess to the crime. Quinn discounted Boyce’s testimony, saying that Boyce, who lived across the hall, could not have heard every conversation Thomas and and his cellmate had.
Quinn also pointed out that the witness had been visited in mid-June by Jackson, who Quinn said was still working on Thomas’ behalf and was involved in the cover-up Thomas and Boston had "concocted" to save themselves from being found guilty of the murder.
The situation was further compounded by pressure put on the local authorities by the Cockayne family to find the killer, Quinn said. Family members went on national news shows to talk about the case, reaching hundreds of people that might one day want to travel to the territory and spend money.
So the government needed to get a conviction, but it should not come at any cost, Quinn said.
"There are several forms of injustice in this case," he told the jury. "There was the injustice of what was done to Mr. Cockayne … what was done to his family. You should not compound that situation with injustice to Mr. Ward."
The jury is set to resume deliberations at 9 a.m. Friday.
