Kimberly McLaughlin, 41, of Belize City, was this afternoon found guilty by a jury of six men and six women on a charge of murder for the death of Anthony “Antics” Herrera, 42, her common-law husband and a race jockey and caretaker for the Castleton Race Track in Burrell Boom, Belize District.
The trial took place before Supreme Court Justice Herbert Lord. The case was prosecuted by Crown Counsel Kaysha Grant, while Carlo Mason defended McLaughlin.
Herrera was chopped once in the right side of his neck early in the morning of December 13, 2008, at his wooden bungalow house on the racetrack grounds; but almost from the start of the case there has been disagreement as to who was responsible – was it two shadowy, unknown men who supposedly invaded the residence that night, or the accused herself?
McLaughlin, who also goes by the name Kimberly Brannon, went to the home of her niece, Police Corporal Allison McLaughlin, at early dawn on the 13th of December, a Saturday, and told her that “Antics” had been killed at his home by two unknown men, one of whom, as he entered, pushed her aside as she responded to their calls at the back door of the residence.
The other man, she claimed, initially stayed outside, then entered with a bag in his hand, retrieved a black-handled machete from the wall next to Herrera’s bed and used it to chop the sleeping Herrera, leaving a large seven-inch open wound, according to Dr. Mario Estradabran, who examined Herrera’s body at a post-mortem.
The niece described her aunt as being “nervous” and tearful while speaking to her.
At the time, McLaughlin said that the attackers did not hurt her, but she told her niece that she sat frozen on her bed, unable to help “Antics”, lest the same happen to her. Only after they were done was she allowed to leave, she claimed, and she was scared to report the matter immediately to police.
Cpl. McLaughlin called her boss, then-OIC of Criminal Investigation Branch, Julio Valdez, and told him about the report, and shortly thereafter police arrived and detained McLaughlin, taking her first to Queen Street Police Station and then to the crime scene, along with a Scenes of Crime technician.
Police at the scene found a bag containing 40 sticks of suspected cannabis and the bloodied machete on the floor in the kitchen area. The rest of the house was apparently untouched.
Police held and questioned McLaughlin at the Queen Street office for most of that weekend, and according to Cpl. McLaughlin, her aunt complained of not being able to sleep due to lights being left on in her room when she, the niece, visited, but did not mention any other possible violations.
Police say that McLaughlin voluntarily gave them a caution statement on December 15, 2008, in which she admitted to chopping Herrera after an argument, supposedly because she was tired of his unwanted sexual advances to her. She claimed in the statement that she was forced to regularly provide anal sex to Herrera, which she despised.
McLaughlin repudiated that statement in open court, testifying from the witness stand that she was taken by case investigating officer Sergeant Dennis Myles to the Racoon Street Police Station in the afternoon of December 15, where he and Assistant Commissioner David Henderson both allegedly threatened and coerced her into giving the statement.
She accused Sgt. Myles of threatening to “bust open her chest” if she did not give him the truth.
She further claimed that in a meeting at the Racoon Street Police Station with ACP Henderson, he promised that if she were to give a certain version of the facts she would be charged with the lesser offense of manslaughter and sent home on bail; he also threatened that if she did not cooperate, she would be put in “Isola,” an isolated room at the Central Prison, she said.
The accused testified that the combination of alleged threats by the senior officers and the stress of Antics’ death and seeing him laid out on his bed at the crime scene earlier on provoked her into tears and ultimately broke her resistance. She was given only a cup of juice while waiting on the Justice of the Peace to witness recording the statement and saw her relatives, particularly her niece, who brought her food, only twice between her initial detention and the recording of the statement.
Both Sgt. Myles and ACP Henderson, in testimony, denied making any statements attributed to them by the accused while she was detained and in their company; and in a statement the Justice of the Peace said that she did not recall anything out of the ordinary with the accused while they were waiting at the Racoon Street Police Station.
On the witness stand, the accused told the court that she regularly visited the deceased in Burrell Boom on weekends for some time before the murder, but denied that they were anything more than friends or were involved in a sexual relationship.
They were together that night, she claimed, but only for a few minutes around 9:00 p.m. when Herrera went to a village grocery. He returned home to pick up some marijuana he was allegedly selling, before leaving again until midnight, when he returned home a little “high” (drunk), and they talked for a while until he went to bed.
She also stated that she did not leave the residence until the following morning, having drunk two large cups of Campari bitters rum brought to her by “Antics” on Friday night.
The jury retired at 12:30 this afternoon and returned at 4:46 this evening after 4 hours and 16 minutes in deliberation.
McLaughlin is the second woman to be convicted of murder this year, before the same judge, in fact, as Viola Pook, 54, who on July 8 was found guilty by a jury of the murder of her husband, Orlando Mai Vasquez, in Rancho Dolores. That incident took place less than two weeks after Herrera’s murder, on December 31, 2008.
Sentencing for McLaughlin has been set for December 2, 2011.