Dubai: Death had been instantaneous for Chechen leader Sulim Yamadayev after a gunman shot him in the back of his head, the police officer first on the murder scene testified in court on Monday.
The Emirati senior police officer also told the Dubai Court of First Instance that he was among the first investigators to arrive at the scene and had found the victim, whom he described as a "Russian man shot dead in the parking lot of Jumeirah Beach Residence's Rimal Tower 6". The bullet had caused an exit wound on the victim's right cheek, he added.
Discarded items
"Two guards who escorted the victim [until then the victim had not been identified] informed me that the assassin escaped from an exit door which led to the main street. The victim was shot from the back of his head and the bullet came out from the right cheek… he died immediately.
"I walked out of the door and... spotted a pair of black gloves. I continued walking down the track before I saw... part of a golden pistol showing from an unzipped bag [that could be] worn around the waist… the bag was thrown on a grassy spot. Thirdly, I found a black sports vest thrown on the beach which is believed to have been left there by the alleged assassin," the officer told Presiding Judge Hamad Abdul Latif Abdul Jawad.
The witness stated that realisation soon dawned that the dead man was the former Chechen military leader, Yamadayev.
"Yamadayev had enemies in Russia and he and his brothers had been subject to a number of assassination attempts. He fled to Dubai away from assassinations and because he feared for his life," testified the police officer.
An Iranian and a Tajik suspect had earlier denied the charge of collaborating in the premeditated murder of Yamadayev, who was shot dead in Dubai in March.
The Iranian clerk, M.T., and Tajik businessman, M.K., also denied the charge of aiding and abetting the alleged killers, when they appeared before the Dubai Court of First Instance yesterday.
Special team assigned
Replying to the cross-examination of Presiding Judge Abdul Jawad, the senior officer claimed that a special investigating team had been assigned to gather evidence about the murder. He said that law enforcement officers arrested M.T. shortly after the murder.
"Preliminary interrogations revealed that M.T. knew the two Russian brothers, named Turbal and Salman, who had rented a flat in Al Rigga. We presumed that the occupants of the flat escaped hurriedly because the door had been left open. We found on the kitchen table a handwritten sketch of the parking where the murder happened. Meanwhile, an informant gave us the plate number of a car driver who constantly visited the flat [the driver turned out to be M.K.]," claimed the officer.
The witness testified that the Tajik suspect was arrested from a villa in Umm Al Quwain, from where police confiscated his laptop. His laptop contained eight photos of Yamadayev, added the officer.
"M.K.'s fingerprints matched with those lifted from the handwritten sketch. M.T.'s fingerprints weren't found in the flat," said the witness when he answered a question put by one of the defence witnesses.
