Defence suggests police ignored confession from original contract killer

The defence team for Oscar Barnes, Tonia McDonald’s alleged killer, yesterday suggested that the police ignored a confession from the original contract killer that his son was also involved in the murder. They further said the son was later freed as part of an arrangement, and Barnes was arrested.

Attorney-at-law Vincent Wellesley, who is representing Barnes, along with Ernest Davis, made the suggestion yesterday as he continued his cross-examination of the lead investigator in Tonia’s murder.

Tonia’s partially burned body was found with her throat slashed in her car, which had been set ablaze along a deserted road in Sherwood Forest in Portland on July 20, 2020.

Denvalyn Minott, the murder convict-turned-prosecution witness, who is currently serving a 19-year prison sentence for his role in the murder, had previously told the court that Everton ‘Beachy Stout’ McDonald offered him $3 million to murder his wife but that he had subcontracted the hit to Barnes.

The court previously heard that Minott’s son was arrested on August 3, 2020, when the police swooped down on Minott’s home during an early morning raid and took him into custody.

The lead investigator, a detective sergeant, however, told the court that Minott’s son was subsequently released but could not say if it was after he had spent a week in custody.

Wellesley, before asking about the police’s investigation as it related to Minott’s son, asked if he had listened to the secretly recorded conversation between Minott and Beachy Stout, and he said, “Yes, I did”.

“Did you hear any time from Minott, or did you hear him say that he, his son, and the taximan were at Mr McDonald’s home waiting to kill Mrs McDonald?” Wellesley asked.

The investigator, however, said he could not recall.

At the same time, he told the court that if the police had had sufficient evidence implicating Minott’s son in the murder, he would have been charged.

But the lawyer told him, “I am suggesting to you that what you heard from Mr Minott that he and son and the taximan were at Mr McDonald’s house to kill Mrs McDonald was sufficient for you to have charged him.”

“I didn’t hear that,” the investigator insisted.

Wellesley later asked, “Did you have an agreement with Denvalyn to release his son?” to which the chief investigator quickly answered “No”.

“And to substitute Mr Barnes instead. Mr Barnes was innocent,” Wellesley continued.

Responding, the investigator said, “I have evidence. That is why I charged him.”

But the lawyer later accused him of concocting a caution statement in which he claimed that Barnes told him that he could have prevented Tonia’s murder.

“Mi could a save ‘Sassy’ life. Mi know somebody a guh dead, even Thursday before she dead … ,” Barnes is reported to have told the police while he was in custody at the Cross Roads Police Station.

According to Barnes in the alleged caution statement, Minott told him that a man paid him $1 million to kill his wife and that he had two other similar contracts.

Wellesley, however, suggested to the investigator that he had fabricated what he described as an epistle because the police had no evidence against his client.

The detective, however, maintained that he had evidence although he told the court on Wednesday that the police had no physical evidence connecting Barnes to the murder, except Minott’s ‘say-so’ and his identification.

The lawyer further told the witness that he did not collect any statement from the officer who went with him during his visit to confirm Barnes’ utterance because he never said those things.

“That’s not true,” the investigator replied.

The trial will continue today.

tanesha.mundle@gleanerjm.com