Man killed Simone Collymore to pay off brother’s debt to ‘don’
WADE Blackwood, one of two shooters in the brazen 2018 double murder of Simone Campbell Collymore and taxi operator Winston Walters, testified Wednesday that a community ‘don’ in St Andrew selected him to carry out the contract killing as a way to repay his brother’s debt after the sibling had an illegal firearm taken from him by the police.
On January 2, 2018, Simone — the wife of Omar Collymore — and Walters were shot and killed by Blackwood and an accomplice, known to Blackwood only as “Jim”.
According to Blackwood, Jim has since been killed by the police.
Simone was travelling in Walters’ taxi at the time of the incident when the cab was stopped outside the entrance gate of the apartment on Stanley Terrace in Red Hills, St Andrew, waiting for the security guard to let them inside. They were pounced upon by Blackwood and another man who had both hopped from a motorcycle, guns in hand.
On trial for the murders are Simone’s husband Omar Collymore, Shaquile Edwards, Michael Adams and Dewayne Pink.
Blackwood received a life sentence after confessing his guilt and accepted a plea deal with prosecutors to turn on his partners in crime for a reduced sentence.
“I fired those shots into the vehicle because I didn’t have any choice. I have a brother who was in the Unruly Gang. The gang operates from Brooke Valley in Duhaney Park. My brother got caught with a gun and went to prison because of it. Sometime before the murder, Jim came to me and said my brother got caught with his gun and, for me to pay for it, I have to murder someone to clear my brother’s debt. When Jim said this Michael Adams was right there beside Jim. Jim said he would get $2 million, but I wouldn’t get any because of my brother’s debt,” Blackwood told the Home Circuit Court on Wednesday.
“Jim seh if mi don’t do it, him ago kill me, mi mother or a family member. I didn’t even get the chance to say anything. Adams told Jim that the lady iffi dead, else dem can’t get the money. This conversation took place in Brooke Valley, behind Kay building in the middle of the scheme,” Blackwood said.
Blackwood told the court that Adams withdrew from the conversation and went for a motor car which he drove close to where the conversation was taking place.
“Dewayne Pink and a next guy were in the vehicle but I don’t know the next guy. I know Mr Pink from 2014, just like Mr Adams. They come link Leeford and [members of] the Unruly Gang. When Adams drive up, Jim came and gave me a gun. It was a Glock 26 which was the same gun I was using in the video of the shooting. The conversation I am telling you about was on a different day from the day of the shooting. He just gave me the Glock and said a today dem ago kill the lady,” Blackwood testified.
“Jim got a next car, a white car. ‘Skinny Man’ ride a bike come to where we were standing and then Adams got a phone call. Pink and the next man came over to where me, Jim, Adams and Skinny Man were. I heard Adams answer the phone but I didn’t know who was on it.
He said the man who gave him the contract to kill the lady said he must drive come up to the yard now because the lady soon leave out. Pink and the other guy went in the car and Adams told Jim to wait for a call because he was going up a di yard now.”
Blackwood said they were there waiting until Jim received the call. He said that when Jim got the call he drove out in a car, while Skinny Man and himself travelled on a motorcycle, and they trailed the taxi Simone was travelling in. However, the mission was aborted because Blackwood, who claimed he had never killed before, got nervous.
“I looked in the car and something came over me. I imagined, what if this was my mother. I told Skinny Man that we have to go back to Brooke Valley,” Blackwood told the court.
Blackwood said fiurther that when he broke the news to Jim and the other men of the failed mission, he came under pressure.
“I told Jim that I didn’t do it. Adams got upset and said if the lady don’t dead today you can’t get any money. Jim then started to tell me over and over again that he was going to kill my mother, me, or somebody else in my family. Adams and him continued cussing and talking. Jim then told him that we would do it the following day.”
The witness said that on January 2, 2018, the following day, he was in the company of Adams and Pink when Adams received a phone call.
“I didn’t hear what the other person said but Adams said, ‘Yes, yes, we a go drive out now’. After that he said the man who gave him the contract said he must come now because the lady soon leave out to go home. Adams drove out with Pink and the next guy and he told Jim to wait until he called him, before he drove out.
“Jim called somebody else with a next bike. Jim and I were the shooters in the incident. When Jim got the phone call, he didn’t speak. When he hung up, he said ‘Come, we a move out now’. Only Jim was armed at that time. He had two guns. He took the same Glock from the previous day and gave it to me,” he said. The guns, he added, belonged to Jim, noting that the Glock was loaded with about eight round.
They then drove to the apartment complex to carry out their deadly mission.
“We saw the car [with Simone as a passenger] stopped at the gate. A security guard was to let them in. Jim came off the bike and start fire inside the car. I went to the left-hand side of the car and fired. A lady was on the left-hand side and a man was on the right,” Blackwood told the jury, pointing out that Jim took a bag from the vehicle because the mission was to let it appear to be a robbery.
The trial continues today.