An off-duty corrections officer was killed with a gardening hoe as he tried to break up a fight over a cricket game, a Supreme Court jury heard.

Daemon Bell, 49, was caught in the middle when he tried to defuse an argument between his brother-in-law and Ajamu Hollis, whose murder trial started yesterday.

Matthew Frick, for the Crown, said during his opening statement that Mr Hollis was in a heated argument with Mr Bell’s brother-in-law before leaving on his motorcycle and promising: “I’ll be back”.

He added that Mr Hollis returned with a gardening hoe.

Mr Frick told the jury: “Daemon Bell tried to defuse the situation, but Mr Hollis struck him in his face with the hoe, and he fell to the ground.”

Mr Bell was taken to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital but died of his injuries later that day.

Mr Hollis has denied murdering Mr Bell at Shelly Bay Park in Hamilton Parish on February 22, 2022.

Mr Frith said that the Crown’s case includes multiple eyewitness accounts and forensic evidence.

He added that the defendant showed “clear intention to commit murder or to commit grievous bodily harm”, particularly when he left the park and returned with the hoe.

Elizabeth Holden, a forensic analyst, said that she was called to the scene later that afternoon to take photographs.

She said that she found and photographed a white bloodstained towel, as well as a beer bottle, a paintbrush, a black-and-red Nolan-brand motorcycle helmet and a gardening hoe, which was also bloodstained.

Ms Holden said that she took swabs of the evidence and tested them in Bermuda.

She said that she returned to the area the next day to photograph the scene, including what appeared to be a bloodstain on the ground, before going to King Edward VII Memorial Hospital to photograph Mr Bell’s autopsy.

The contents of the compartment underneath Mr Hollis’s motorcycle seat, which was broken off its hinges, were also photographed.

Ms Holden said that she organised the photographs into two albums — one with 22 photographs of the crime scene and evidence found there and another with four photographs of Mr Bell’s facial wounds.

Charles Richardson, for the defence, questioned whether the area was cordoned off when she arrived. Ms Holden said that it was not.

She agreed when questioned further that civilian witnesses were still on the field and that it was possible for them to have spoken with one another or police and altered their stories as a result.

Ms Holden also agreed, when pointed out by Mr Richardson, that it was best for eyewitnesses to be as independent from one another as possible.

She also insisted that she was unaware of who was in charge of cordoning off the scene.

Questioned about the swab tests, Ms Holden said that she had tested the bloodstained area of items but not the non-bloodstained areas.

Melesia Clarke, a member of the Criminal Investigations Unit, said that she went to a residence along Shelly Bay Road in the evening on the day of the incident to collect CCTV footage from its security cameras.

She told the court that she downloaded four camera angles on to her computer and created a “viewing log” as she analysed the footage.

A viewing log, she said, listed everything she noticed after seeing the clips multiple times, and included the dates and times they were noticed, why she created the log and how many cameras were involved.

The jury was shown some of the CCTV footage.

The camera was pointed at the easternmost entrance to the Shelly Bay Park field and was focused on the road, which had minimal traffic at the time, near the entrance.

At about two minutes into the footage, a man on a motorcycle to could seen pulling out of the entrance and returning a few minutes later.

Several minutes after the motorcycle’s return, a police car can be seen pulling into the entrance.

The trial continues.

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