Expert details communication among defendants as phone data takes spotlight

Phone data records showed that businessman Omar Collymore had called his wife for minutes, half hour before she was murdered and immediately after, he made another minute-long call to the man whom he allegedly contracted to have her killed.

Collymore, after making that one-minute call to the alleged contract killer, defendant Michael 'Crayboss' Adams, called him again three minutes later. Collymore, also attempted to contact Adams 11 minutes after his wife was shot and killed.

The phone data records further revealed that Adams and one of the shooters, Jim, exchanged several calls on the day of the shooting between 3:36 p.m. and 9:35 p.m. Cell site information also placed Jim close to Campbell-Collymore’s apartment when the calls started.

The 32-year-old businesswoman and mother of two was gunned down outside her Forest Ridge apartment in Red Hills, St Andrew, along with taxi driver Winston 'Corey' Walters at 4:59 p.m. on January 2, 2018.

Campbell-Collymore was shot 19 times while Walters was shot five times. The two were killed by two pillion riders, who hopped off separate motorcycles and sprayed the taxi they were in with bullets, as they waited to gain access to the apartment complex.

Collymore, who is accused of orchestrating the plot, is being tried for murder, along with Adams, Dewayne Pink, and Shaquilla Edwards, in the Home Circuit Court.

The phone records and cell site details were disclosed on Tuesday during the testimony of an expert witness, a deputy superintendent of police from the police’s Communication and Forensics and Cybercrime Unit, who had analysed the data, which was received from the island’s two main telecommunications providers.

The cop testified that he received information on 43 numbers, including those belonging to the defendants and Campbell-Collymore, from the service providers after notices and court orders were served.

The witness, in analysing a colour-coded report, which he had prepared from the data showing the different calls among the individuals, testified that Collymore made the one-minute call to his wife on January 2, the day of the shooting, at 3:29 p.m., before calling Adams a minute later, followed by a second call to Adams three minutes later.

The witness further shared that cell site data showed that the cell site tower in the Red Hills area was used by Collymore’s number to place the call to his wife, while for the other number that he used to call Adams, there was no cell site information. The number, however, was an overseas phone number.

The cell site data showed that the Railway cell tower in the downtown Kingston area was used by the number attributed to Adams to receive the phone calls.

The witness, in analysing several calls made between the numbers attributed to Jim and Adams, said that based on the data, Adams was travelling from downtown in a westerly direction when the calls started. Based on the cell site data, Adams travelled near the crime scene as the Upper Red Hills cell site tower was used between 3.55 p.m. and 4:01 p.m. in five attempted calls to Jim.

Pertaining to the calls made by Collymore, following his wife's murder, the witness testified that eight calls were attempted between 4:10:51 p.m. and 4:12:05 p.m. on January 2.

However, he said the data showed that the calls lasted between 13 and 15 milliseconds, which would suggest that they were attempted calls, based on his experience.

However, there was no cell site data for the number that Collymore used, while cell towers in Havendale and Pembroke Exchange registered for the number attributed to Adams.

According to the expert, when two towers are used, it usually means that the person is moving or that the phone switched towers to receive a stronger signal.

The witness further shared that there were calls from Adams to Edwards on January 2 at 4:10 p.m. But, while the cell tower had registered for Adams's call, none was detected for Edwards’ phone.

He further shared that three calls were exchanged between the two at 4:29 p.m. The cell site data, however, placed Edwards in the Waltham Park area in the Corprate Area and Adams in the Three Mile area in St Andrew at the time of the calls.

As for Pink, the court heard that Adams called Pink three times at 4:55 p.m., but there was no cell site data for the number assigned to Pink.

Meanwhile, in giving a general summary of the phone data records for the defendants between December 1, 2017 and March 2018, the witness said there were 230 lines of communication, meaning calls answered and unanswered, and text messages, from Adams to Collymore, and 1,095 lines of communication from Collymore to Adams.

Between Adams and Edwards, there were 600 coming from Adams and 333 from Edwards.

As it relates to Pink and Adams, the court heard that there were 286 lines of communication from Adams and 113 from Pink.

The witness, when asked if there was communication between Edwards and Collymore, said he only saw one line of communication from Edwards to the businessman, but seven in the reverse, in respect to one of Edwards’ numbers. For Edwards' second number, he said there were four lines of communication from Edwards and eight from Collymore.

Edwards, in a statement, had told the police that he had only spoken to Collymore twice and that he had backed out of the murder plot after surveilling Campbell-Collymore’s movements on Adams' instruction.

According to him, he found out that Campbell-Collymore was Collymore’s wife after her death.

The trial will continue today.

tanesha.mundle@gleanerjm.com