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A First: DPP Takes Stand In Cahueque Trial
posted (March 19, 2014)

Today, at the Supreme Court trial of 21 year-old Aracely Cahueque, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Cheryl-Lynn Vidal herself, took the witness stand to try to assist the prosecution with evidence.

DPP Vidal testified that when police was initially investigating the case, accused and now acquitted killer Brandon Budna gave 2 separate written statements which were going to be used as evidence.

The first was a written confession, which taken together with those of the other 2 men, provided police with a detailed narrative of how 18 year-old Raylene Dyer was killed. Those statements, as has widely been reported, were thrown out because the accused were able to convince Justice Denis Hanonmansingh that the police brutalized them into giving it.

Well, it turns out that Budna gave police a second statement, in which he agreed to cooperate with the DPP's Office as a witness against Aracely Cahueque. The condition of that statement was that he would be tried first, and that this second statement couldn't be used against him. This second statement was only to be used to prosecute Cahueque, and that Budna would gain no favour from it, such as immunity, only the satisfaction that it was the right thing to do, and that Cahueque, who was allegedly the mastermind, would face the consequences just like the rest.

True to their word, this is the first time that this statement has made it into the public domain as part of Cahueque's trial, and so, its contents are what the prosecution is seeking to use to link Aracely Cahueque to the murder of Raylene Dyer.

Defense Attorney Dickey Bradley cross-examined DPP Vidal and challenged the decision for the police to have taken a separate statement in which Budna supposedly implicates himself while trying to cooperate with investigators in the Cahueque prosecution.

This is only day 2 of the prosecution's case in a marathon trial, which will see at least 17 witnesses give testimony for the jury to consider.

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