Police to test Woolmer's last meal for drugs

KINGSTON: Leaving no stone unturned in the probe of Pakistani cricket coach Bob Woolmer's murder, Jamaican police is investigating if his last room-service dinner was laced with drugs to subdue him.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Mark Shields, who is leading the investigation, said the man of Woolmer's stature could not have been manually strangulated unless he was impaired.

"He was 6ft 1 in and a big man, and unless he was drugged or impaired it would perhaps have been difficult to restrain him. We are looking at whether his food was drugged," he said.

"The meal was thrown away after he put the tray outside his room, but we are conducting toxicology and tissue tests," Shields was quoted as saying by 'The New Zealand Herald' on Tuesday.

Police, who are treating the CCTV cameras as 'critical' piece of evidence, said the investigation process was taking a little longer because 'the CCTV was in a particular format and we have to preserve the original cassettes and I had to have them converted into a digital format so we can begin the process of reviewing them methodically.'

"That does not happen in five minutes. We have got it now, and my officers are starting to go through it."

Cameras were at either end of the corridor on the floor and near the lifts.

The 58-year-old Woolmer was found dead in his Jamaica Pegasus hotel room last Sunday morning, less than 24 hours after Pakistan was defeated by Ireland in their World Cup match.