New trial ordered in killing of Pa. man

CHARLOTTE AMALIE, U.S. Virgin Islands (AP) — A judge in the U.S. Virgin Islands has ordered a new trial in the killing of a Pennsylvania man because his family reportedly paid two of the prosecution’s witnesses.

Judge Brenda Hollar said during a hearing Friday that the family of the late James Cockayne paid the witnesses $5,000 each, Douglas Dick, criminal division chief of the island’s justice department, said Sunday. He declined to elaborate.

Kamal Thomas and Anselmo Boston were each sentenced in July to 121‚Ñ2 years in prison for assault and other charges in connection to the beating and stabbing of Cockayne, 21, of New Hope, Pa., in June 2007 outside a bar in St. John.

Hollar ordered a new trial for the defendants after prosecutors revealed Friday that two of the witnesses who had testified against them received the money, Dick said.

Prosecutors said they became aware of the payments only after a Justice Department official told them about it.

Iris Kern, the department’s domestic violence policy coordinator, told The Associated Press on Sunday that she helped the Cockayne family contact the witnesses and that she believes the money paid to them was intended as a reward. She also acknowledged informing prosecutors of the payments, but did not say when she told them.

“I don’t think they were trying to hide anything or else why would they write checks?” she said Sunday, referring to the Cockayne family.

She declined further comment, saying she did not want to “muddy the waters.”

Justice Department spokeswoman Sara Lezama did not return an e-mail Sunday seeking comment, and the attorneys involved could not be reached.

On Saturday, The Virgin Islands Daily News quoted Lezama as saying that the department had not decided whether it would appeal Hollar’s ruling.

A third defendant, Jahleel Ward, was found guilty of first-degree murder in Cockayne’s death, but Hollar also ordered a retrial for him in July after it was revealed in court that Thomas told another inmate he was the one who killed Cockayne.