Connor accuses police of fabricating evidence

(CNS): During his second day of testimony, Shane Connor (44) doubled down on his allegations that the police not only botched the investigation into the home invasion, for which he is charged with a catalogue of crimes, but have framed him by fabricating telephone evidence. Connor is charged with a violent aggravated burglary and a number of other related offences that happened in June 2017.

Three other men have already been convicted in connection with the crimes, including Elmer Wright, whose WhatsApp messages downloaded by the police were part of the evidence that connected Connor to the home invasion and led to him being charged.

“A lot of wrong has been done to me, sir,” Connor told the judge from the witness box, as he denied the evidence presented by the crown. As prosecutor Scott Wainwright questioned him about the downloaded messages, which had been sent from Wright’s phone to the number that Connor has accepted is his, he denied sending any of them.

He repeatedly accused the RCIPS of making up the document that purported to show incriminating text conversations between Connor and Wright about the crime, including the arrests in the case, what evidence the police had, what had happened to Caine and Nikel Thomas, the brothers also convicted in this case, and how the proceeds of the burglary were going to be divided up.

But time and again, when asked what they meant, Connor said, “I am not the author of these messages.” He said there was no evidence that the messages came from his phone, as he described them as preposterous and absurd.

“This created document didn’t come out of my phone,” he said, adding that if the prosecutor had the evidence he said he did, he would show it to the jury. “Unna think Caymanians are idiots,” he said. Wainwright, however, pointed out that the document in front of him was the evidence.

Connor repeatedly accused the senior investigating officer on the case of corruption and bringing poor policing methods to Cayman from his country of origin, Jamaica. He accused the police officer of jealousy and claimed he was the reason why his mother had lost her house, among many other allegations.

Connor said that they had failed to secure CCTV evidence from the Pirates Cove bar in East End, which is where he has always maintained that he was on the night of the crime, or to take statements from people who could have helped exonerate him. He also accused the police of not getting the phone evidence from his handset that would have supported his innocence, saying this was because of the corruption.

Connor said the chief investigating officer was “the king of corruption” in a “dysfunctional police force” with “unscrupulous officers who think they above the law” who had operated from secret police stations.

Wainwright asked him why his phone showed up on a George Town cell mast in the early morning hours of 17 June as the crime was taking place, and not in East End where he claimed he was. In response, Connor told the court that the police officer who gave the telephone evidence is not an expert and that this evidence did not mean he was in George Town.

The case continues.