By L.K. Hewlett
St. Kitts Reporter
The two men taken into custody for questioning following the June 9, killing of Craig Hamilton have since been released without any charges being filed against them.
Police have refused to disclose the names of the men but The Observer is in possession of the name of one of the individuals, a Conaree resident.
Within hours of the shooting that took place two Saturdays ago in a Conaree shop, police had picked up two men. They questioned the men for some days then released them, uncharged.
Hamilton had been acquitted of a murder just five months before the masked gunman entered the shop where he was and opened fire while he sat next to the shopkeeper.
Hamilton’s relatives said that persons in the community were “rejoicing” over the twenty-seven year old’s death saying that he had taken a life and got away with it, so his death was a justice of sorts. The family refuted the claims that Hamilton had been
killed as some form of retaliation for the murder he had been found not guilty of. They claimed instead, that Hamilton’s death was a ‘hit’ that a certain group of men in the Conaree village had paid someone to carry out.
“A relative of his came home and met a large quantity of bullets in his house, bullets that didn’t belong to him. He told Craig about them because he was scared since he didn’t know how they had got in his house or who put them there. Craig turned the bullets over to the police; probably thousands of bullets. He did what he thought was the right thing. The men who the bullets belonged to beat up Craig’s relative when they went back to get their bullets and he said he didn’t know anything about any bullets,” the relative said.
The person told The Observer that the men found out that Hamilton had turned the ammunition over to the police and threatened to kill him.
“The Police know who the men are, I don’t under stand why they haven’t picked them up. I heard that it was one of the guys the police picked up who was paid to kill Craig. I don’t know what he told the police but they didn’t charge him they let him and another fellow go,” the person said.
The Observer contacted a member of the Criminal Investigation Department who confirmed that two men were taken into custody after the shooting, questioned and released.
“We took one person into custody the same day of the murder and the next person was taken into custody on the following day. Both men were questioned and released a few days later. No one has been charged for the Hamilton murder as yet. We cannot release the names of the individuals since they were merely assisting police with the investigation and were not charged with a crime,” the source said.
Regarding the allegation that Hamilton had turned over a large quantity of ammunition to the Police, the source said it was ‘absolutely not true’.
“I can say for a fact that Hamilton never turned over any bullets to the Police. We cannot speak to the motive for the crime, we have our assumptions and intelligence but we cannot reveal those,” he refuted. The official source said he could not comment as to whether or not Hamilton’s relative or any one else had indeed turned over a large quantity of ammunition to the Police.
Hamilton’s mother told this newspaper that the pathologist who performed the autopsy said Hamilton had died from a single gunshot wound to the back of the head. She said that she examined her son’s body and saw a hole in his hip that to her, resembled a bullet hole.
Hamilton’s funeral is set for Saturday at the People’s Evangelistic Centre in Needsmust.
