44 year-old Edel Rios, a Guatemalan National residing in the Valley of Peace is spending his second night free after 4 years on remand for the murder of 35 year-old Pedro Arturo Romero. He was acquitted in his murder trial before Justice Denis Hanomansingh.
Romero was chopped to death on December 29, 2008 sometime before 7 p.m. on road leading into the Valley of Peace.
He received several chop wounds to the neck, face and shoulder which ended up being fatal.
A week after his death, police arrested Rios and charged him with murder because they allegedly recorded an oral caution statement saying quote, "He wanted to kill me so I chopped him up." End quote.
That statement was tested in his murder trial, and in the end, Justice Hanomansingh ruled that the statement was inadmissible because in his view, the accused did not give that confession voluntarily.
As a result, Senior Crown Counsel Cecil Ramirez had to hinge his case against Rios on circumstantial evidence.
The jury deliberated for 3 hours on all the evidence presented to them, and they returned with a verdict of not guilty against Rios, setting him free for the first time in 4 years.
Rios was represented by attorney Ernest Staine.
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