The defence closed its case yesterday at the trial of 25-year-old Sheldon Pusey, charged with the murder of Ambassador Peter King, 64.

Defence lawyer Berry Bryan said the defence was going to call a doctor, but because the doctor was unavailable yesterday, he was closing the case. King was chopped and stabbed several times at his house at Waterloo Road, St Andrew, between March 19 and 20, 2006.

Forced

Pusey said he went to King's house about a job and while there King began forcing him to be intimate with him. He said he took a knife from a cup on a bedside table and stabbed him.

The trial began on January 19 in the Home Circuit Court.

Bryan, addressing the 12-member jury comprising 11 women, asked which of them would not defend themselves if they went in search of a job and someone tried to rape them.

"Which one of you would not fight against it to the extent of death?" Bryan queried.

Historical case

Bryan said Pusey's case was the most historical in Jamaica, apart from that of National Hero Marcus Mosiah Garvey. Describing King as a man who preyed on young men from the ghetto, Bryan said Pusey's only crime was to go searching for a job. "He went for a job and he winds up in the dock and that leads to him being in custody for three years," Bryan said.

Bryan said the most crucial piece of evidence in the case was the two knives which Superintendent McArthur Sutherland got from King's house. He said the knives were not tendered in evidence and asked the jury to draw the inference as to why that piece of evidence was suppressed.