CCTV Provides Clues to Woolmer Murder

Closed-circuit television footage from the hotel where Bob Woolmer was murdered is providing sharp images of potential suspects, police in Jamaica said last night.

Detectives have begun identifying people present on the 12th floor of the Pegasus hotel in Kingston, Jamaica, during the time the Pakistan cricket coach was strangled in his room.

They also plan to gather DNA samples, fingerprints and photographs of everyone staying in the 300-room hotel at the time of the murder. "It is a huge task but I believe it has to be done," said Mark Shields, the deputy commissioner of Jamaican police.

"I am hoping that when the forensic report is through and we have studied it we will find fingerprints and also DNA of a suspect. If people were in that room innocently or not at all, then the easiest way to eliminate them is by getting those samples now."

Mr Shields said the task, which may involve as many as 1,000 guests, could take months and he would not rule out a second autopsy after the first was declared inconclusive by a forensic pathologist.

"The jury may want a second postmortem and if we arrest someone this week and charge them the defence counsel will want a second," he said. Mr Shields denied reports that the CCTV footage, originally recorded on a VHS tape and then transferred by police to a digital format, were either blank or too grainy to be of use.

"Progress is going quite well," he said. "I have looked at a few of the still images and satisfied myself that I can easily identify people who were on that floor."

He said he recognised several of the people he interviewed in the days after Mr Woolmer's body was discovered on March 18.

The tapes show the lift and one end of the corridor but do not show the entrance to Mr Woolmer's room.

Mr Shields said his 50-strong team of officers had viewed the footage recorded between about 7.30pm local time on March 17 when Mr Woolmer entered his room and midday the next day when his body was discovered by a chambermaid.