Ex-junior baller guilty of murder

Tears trickled down the face of Romancia Makaila Odwin as the jury announced it had found her guilty of murder.

The former junior netballer, who had been on bail, was later remanded to Dodds Prison pending sentencing.

Odwin, 26, of Whopping, Orange Hill, St James, was charged with murdering fish vendor Ronald “Smokey” Skeete, between July 18 and 19, 2020.

She had also been accused of wounding Zonelle Sobers with intent to main, disfigure or disable her, and the lesser, alternate count of unlawfully wounding Sobers, between July 18 and 19, 2020.

She was represented by attorney Sade Harris, while Director of Public Prosecutions Alliston Seale, SC, and State Counsel Paul Prescod prosecuted.

The 12-member jury took about three hours to deliberate before it unanimously found her guilty of murdering Skeete and guilty of wounding Sobers with intent.

Justice Smith-Bovell ordered a pre-sentencing report, as well as a psychological report, on the offender.

She revoked Odwin’s bail and remanded her to Dodds Prison until May 29 when submissions on sentence will be heard.

During the trial, the court heard from complainant Zonelle ‘Natalie’ Sobers who said she had found sexually explicit WhatsApp messages between ‘Romancia’ and Skeete on Skeete’s phone sometime before she walked in on Odwin stabbing him in his house.

The woman said she had become suspicious that there was some kind of relationship between the two after the deceased started taking Odwin to work.

Sobers said after becoming suspicious, she searched Skeete’s phone and saw a number of messages.

There was one from Odwin to Skeete which said: “My father say we got to stop this. Natalie ain’t no c***.”

Another message from Odwin to the deceased asked Skeete for “Burger King or something and bring one for my mother”. Another asked him for hair.

She read there were other messages from the now convicted murderer asking Skeete to book an apartment “for the two of them”.

“But mostly about sex acts they performed on each other,” Sobers added.

She further told the court she was at home, after getting in from work, when she heard a knock on the door. It was Odwin asking for Skeete. She said she told her Skeete was busy and advised her not to wait.

Left and returned

Odwin left, but returned about ten minutes later.

She again told her Skeete was busy and Odwin left, Sobers said. The witness recalled she then did some washing and fell asleep.

During the night, Sobers said the sound of something falling in the back bedroom woke her up. She went to investigate, realised the bedroom door was partially closed and, when she pushed it open, she saw “Romancia over Skeete stabbing”.

“He was on the ground flat and blood was on the ground, causing me to fall down along with Romancia,” she said.

“I holler, ‘What you doing girl?’ and she stabbed at me,” Sobers said, indicating she was stabbed by her ear.

“So I grab at she hand but being she taller than me, I get another one in my head. I tell myself, ‘Wha he down there like he dead and she ain’t killing me’ and I attempt to run,” Sobers testified.

However, she said she slipped in the blood and, as she got up to run, Odwin stabbed her in the back.

“I look back and give she a kick and say, ‘Watch ya c*** girl’ and run straight down by she house.”

There, she was attended to by Odwin’s father and given something to wear as she only had on a pair of Skeete’s boxers.

However Odwin, in her defence, said she had not intended to kill Skeete or harm Sobers.

“When I reflect on this situation, I was a young girl taken advantage of by old folks and this old man,” she said.

Odwin said on the night of the incident she “left home with the intention of speaking to Ronald and getting the money owed to me”.

She said Skeete invited her into the house and ordered her to “perform sexual favours”, including having anal sex with him.

“I had no intention of harming him and Zonelle when I get there. But Ronald approached me with a knife and I try to speak with him, talk him out of the things he wanted. He was adamant. He was becoming angry and he wouldn’t allow me to leave.

“He had locked the door when I entered the bedroom and when we started to scuffle the knife dropped. I picked it up,” Odwin told the court.

“I can recall giving him one stab and I tried to unlock the door to run home. He grabbed onto me and I started stabbing. I didn’t want to kill him. I wanted him to stop attacking me.” (HLE)

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