Police scrutinise fixing for motive

KINGSTON/LONDON: Hours before the Pakistani squad finally left Jamaica on Saturday evening, skipper Inzamam-ul-Haq, bowling coach Mushtaq Ahmed, and manager Talat Ali were spoken to by detectives. Deputy Police Commissioner Mark Shields said the trio was questioned to clear up ambiguities in earlier statements.

Inzamam said: “It wasn’t anything special. Maybe they missed out on a few questions. Perhaps they asked me a few questions more because I am the captain.”

News reports said investigators were trying to find out whether the coach was murdered after falling out with the players. Rumours are rife of an angry clash between Woolmer and some players on the bus back to the hotel after the defeat to Ireland. Two police officers who were on the bus during the alleged row have also been interviewed.

The move came amid speculation that Woolmer may have been about to blow the whistle on a match-fixing scandal. Earlier, Shields told The Observer of London that he is looking into allegations that irregular betting patterns might explain Pakistan’s unlikely defeat.

Shields said the odds delivered on the match had raised questions: “What were the odds on Ireland winning? I understand they were extremely good.”

Friends of Woolmer are sure he would have confronted players if he felt they had thrown the match. His relationship with some of them was already strained in the build-up to the World Cup. Jamaican police, however, said officially that they had “no knowledge” of such a row.

Inzamam was asked why he had changed rooms, from the 12th to the fifth floor, before the murder. He said it was because he wanted to be with the rest of the players.

Police questioned Talat why he moved from the 12th floor to the hotel’s Trelawny suite on the 17th floor using the pseudonym of ‘Newman’ the night after the murder. He is understood to have replied: “Because I was scared and everyone was scared.”

Unconfirmed reports suggest Mushtaq Ahmed was asked by officers: “Why do you have a cut on your nose? Did you go to hospital?” His explanation was that he was hit by a ball in the warm-up session before the Ireland game.

The Pakistan team eventually left Jamaica at 6pm local time, but operations manager Asad Mustafa and biokineticist Murray Stephenson, who will escort Woolmer’s body to South Africa, stayed back.

Meanwhile, some reports claimed that the coach was initially poisoned and then strangled. Detectives believe that food or alcohol delivered to his hotel room might have been poisoned to incapacitate him, The Daily Telegraph reported.

A source told The Sunday Express that police will analyse the use of key cards to track movements on the floor and also examine CCTV footage. Two cameras covering the lift doors and the stairway leading to the floor apparently hold the answers. Detectives hope to draw up a shortlist of people who were on the floor at the time of the murder using information from the swipe cards and the videotape.

It is also being investigated whether Woolmer’s killer, or killers, used a spare or stolen key card to get into his 12th floor room. The only floors at the Pegasus where you can go without a key card are the first floor and the seventeenth.

Police are still trying to ascertain the exact time of Woolmer’s death. A complete forensic report is expected today.