A forensic evidence officer admitted under cross-examination on Monday that he never tested the suspected murder weapon or numerous other surfaces for fingerprints – a stunning revelation that defence attorney Sherfield Bowen used to challenge the integrity of the police investigation into the 2018 killing of Maurison Thomas.

The admission came during the murder trial of Delano Forbes, 31, who faces charges in four separate killings that occurred between 2017 and 2018. Forbes is accused of murdering Wilfred “Bongo” Williams in Swetes, Shawn Henry in Point, Lisue Williams on All Saints Road, and Thomas in All Saints. Each case is being tried individually, with Thomas’s murder proceeding first.

Thomas, found dead on March 7, 2018, suffered fatal brain injuries and skull fractures caused by a blunt object struck with extreme force.

The forensic officer testified virtually Monday that he arrived at the crime scene – a two-bedroom wooden house – and documented it through photographs. Inside, he found Thomas’s naked body lying face down in a pool of blood, covered with clothes and chair cushions. A metal pipe with apparent bloodstains rested on a nearby chair.

According to his testimony, blood evidence was spread throughout the house: trails leading into both bedrooms and the kitchen, splatter on the front-room walls and outside the bathroom, and multiple shoe-print impressions across the floors. The court was shown graphic photographs illustrating the full extent of the scene.

The officer also documented items recovered from a pump house where Forbes was captured weeks after the murder following a manhunt. Those items included an army-coloured hoodie, a Tommy Hilfiger wallet containing $285, two cell phones, a black bag, red boots, and other belongings.

Thomas’s daughter had previously testified that she witnessed someone in an army-coloured hoodie fleeing her father’s house shortly before his body was discovered. She identified the wallet – which she’d given her father for Father’s Day – the belt, and the black bag as belonging to him.

But Bowen’s cross-examination exposed what he characterized as a failure in the investigation. The officer acknowledged he never created a crime scene diagram, a basic investigative protocol.

More troubling, he admitted he failed to dust for fingerprints on most surfaces, including the metal pipe believed to be the murder weapon, the chairs, a barrel, a refrigerator, and the cushions covering the victim’s body.

When Bowen pressed him on why he didn’t test the pipe, the officer said he didn’t know if DNA testing was conducted, claiming that fell outside his responsibilities. He said another officer was collecting evidence for forensic analysis but couldn’t confirm whether any items were actually tested.

The officer defended not testing the cushions by saying the department lacks capability to process fabric materials. He explained he didn’t dust certain surfaces because they were porous and wouldn’t hold clear prints, though he conceded a refrigerator would be ideal for recovering fingerprints but admitted he never checked it.

Bowen repeatedly accused the officer of “abandoning his duty.”

The officer acknowledged photographing shoe impressions in blood throughout the house but said he couldn’t lift prints from liquid. When asked if he’d attempted to identify the shoe manufacturer or size, he said overlapping impressions made identification impossible and that blood would cause expansion.

The defence also highlighted a discrepancy involving Thomas’s social security card. Crime scene photographs showed the card lying in blood near the victim’s body, yet witnesses say it was later found elsewhere. The officer agreed that no IDs were photographed by him from the evidence gathered at the pump house.

A second officer then testified about digital evidence extracted from phones recovered at the scene. He said he retrieved numerous files, including many that had been deleted, from a memory card in a phone allegedly belonging to Thomas.

The prosecution played a video in open court that appeared to show someone wearing an army-coloured hoodie and jeans—which looked like Forbes—filming himself searching through a black bag prosecutors say belonged to Thomas. The shaky footage captured various items in the background including boots, peanut butter, a Dutch Lady can, and other products as the person moved around.

The trial was adjourned until December 4.