The Director of Public Prosecutions, Senior Counsel Shalimar Ali-Hack, has discontinued murder charges against former Police Detective Derwin Eastman, six years after he was first charged and remanded to prison.

The decision was reportedly based on a lack of evidence to get a conviction.

Eastman was charged and remanded to jail in 2017 for the murder of businessman Godfrey Scipio aka Saga. He was charged along with two other men, based on the advice of the DPP.

His co-accused, Policeman Jemison Williams was freed of the same charge in 2021 after a City Magistrate found that there was not enough evidence tying him to the crime.

Another man, Aubrey Bobb, was also committed to stand trial in the High Court for the same murder. However, when his case was called in 2022, he admitted to the crime.

Bobb was sentenced to life in prison. It was the same Bobb who had implicated the two Policemen in the murder, telling investigators at the time that he was provided with the weapon by one of the Policemen to carry out the crime.

It is believed that his guilty plea might have triggered the decision for the withdrawal of the murder charge against former Policeman Derwin Eastman.

Eastman was preparing to stand trial in the High Court when the decision was made a few days ago. He was released from prison on Monday.

The former Police Detective had always declared his innocence of the crime and had claimed that he was “set up” by some members of the same Guyana Police Force that he served.

Businessman, Godfrey Scipio aka “Saga” was shot dead on the night of October 12, 2017 as he left a Kitty hotel in the company of a woman. A motive for his murder was not determined, but there had been a number of previous attempts on his life.

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