Jury to hand down decision in Laing Avenue shooting

Recaptured Prison escapee Stafrei Alexander is today expected to know his fate in relation to the attempted murder of fellow Laing Avenue resident Curtis Thom, who was shot at his home in March 2015.

Alexander has denied that he had tried to kill his neighbour, but a High Court jury will decide on his innocence or guilt during deliberations.
Stafrei Alexander has been accused of discharging a loaded firearm in the direction of Curtis Thom, who had sustained gunshot injury hours after his daughter’s christening. The court heard that after the christening, based on his beliefs, Thom had proceeded to walk into his home backwards when Alexander mumbled remarks and pointed a gun at him.
Thom was shot twice, and was hospitalised for seven weeks, during which he obtained surgery to correct his injuries. Based on the account of an expert witness, a .38 revolver was the firearm of choice on the night in question.
Alexander is being represented by attorneys-at-law Stanley Moore, S.C. and Maxwell McKay, while attorneys Lisa Cave and Orinthia Schmidt are the state’s prosecutors in this High Court trial.
Alexander, who is also known as Stafrei Hopkinson Alexander, was apprehended in late July last year after a special operation in Berbice.
This came weeks after he had fled the Camp Street Penitentiary during an inferno, around the same time when several prisoners, including death row inmate and Bartica mass killer Mark Royden “Smallie” Williams and now dead former Policeman and prisoner Uree Varswyck, had fled. Prison officer Odinga Wickham was killed during that ordeal, and century-old sections of that penitentiary had been flattened.
Alexander had previously fled lawful custody for six months, before finally being recaptured at Kurupukari Crossing in the Rupununi, Region Nine (Upper Takutu/Upper Essequibo) in May 2016.