Accused expected food items, not guns when she collected package

When Maria Maleissa Moseley went to the Cheapside General Post Office on July 12, 2012, it was to collect a package containing canned meats, not firearms.

That was part of the statement the Villa Park, Brittons Hill, St Michael resident read from the dock in Supreme Court No. 2 on Tuesday, as her trial continued before Justice Randall Worrell and a nine-member jury.

Moseley is accused of having three firearms without a licence as well as 24 rounds of ammunition without a valid permit.

She outlined in a statement that after a cousin indicated he planned to open a shop, he told her he was sending home some Spam and household items and wanted to send a barrel in her name. She subsequently received a slip from the post office about the package and contacted her cousin who said he was sending a taxi to take her to collect it.

When the taxi arrived, Moseley said, her cousin was in the vehicle and she told him if he was coming he could have collected the package himself. She got into the taxi with her children and went to the post office. The cousin and children waited in the vehicle while she went inside.

Moseley said when the package was opened, the clerk took out “a metal thing out of the flour” and said it was a gun.

“I couldn’t move. I was in shock,” she recalled, saying that a gentleman came and she asked for a phone call. She refused to sign the paper he instructed her to. The accused testified that she gave the police her cousin’s name and informed them that he and her children were waiting outside, but when the officer went to check, he did not see any of her family members.

Moseley said she and her cousin were close before the incident and she could not believe he would do something like that.

She said her cousin did not call her while she was in prison and, in fact, they had not spoken in the 11 years since she was charged.

“I say if he could do something like that, he could do anything,” Moseley stated.

The trial continues on Wednesday.