Michaela hearing: Court told details of alleged confession
In a statement given on January 13, which was read in court, Avinash Treebhoowon said he and Sandip Mooneea, his co-accused, would not have killed her had she not seen their faces.
However, at the hearing, Sanjeev Teeluckdharry, a lawyer for Treebhoowon, reserved the right to challenge the “voluntariness and regularity” of his client’s statement.
Both accused have said their confessions to killing the honeymooner in Mauritius were coerced.
The statement detailed Treebhoowon’s movements on the day Michaela was murdered at the Legends hotel.
On January 10, the room attendant started work at 7.15am. At 1pm, he saw a “do not disturb” sign on the door of room 1025 but said John McAreavey told him to come back in five minutes. Thirty minutes later, the tag was still on the door. The accused consulted his supervisor, Mooneea. No one answered the door so Moone said to clean the room.
“I refused because the room was tagged DND [do not disturb] and I told Sandip: ‘Let’s go together, I will not go alone.’ ”
Treebhoowon entered the room at about 2.10pm. Nobody was inside.
While dusting the furniture, he saw a wallet with some notes sticking out.
“I thought about stealing some notes,” the statement said. He checked whether anyone was on the terrace of rooms 1023 and 1025, and that when he returned to room 1025, Mooneea was near the bathroom.
“I told him that there were some notes in the wallet and we could split up between ourselves,” Treebhoowon said.
He then heard someone entering. “I saw a white woman with brown hair, slim and young, wearing a blue bikini. When she came in, she saw the wallet in my hand... She shouted: ‘What are you doing? What are you searching in my pocket?’.
“I pushed her and she fell... The woman was shouting and I told Sandip to prevent her from shouting. When she was on the floor, she was not injured.
“He pressed on the throat of the woman to stop her from shouting... He continued to press on the throat for a minute.”
During this time, Ms Harte tried to free herself from her attackers’ hold.
“He [Mooneea] kept on pressing on her throat until the woman lost consciousness... We dumped her in the bathtub. We let the water flow to erase any clues.”
