THE Royal Court began hearing closing arguments yesterday in the trial of two seamen accused of manslaughter after their freight vessel collided with a fishing trawler off Jersey’s west coast.
Ukrainian seaman Artur Sevash-Zade (35) and his former colleague Lewis Carr, the 30-year-old second officer from Sunderland, deny three counts of unlawful killing after their vessel, the Commodore Goodwill, collided with L’Ecume II almost three years ago.
All three members of L’Ecume’s crew, captain Michael Michieli and crewmen Larry Simyunn and Jervis Baligat, died following the collision on 8 December 2022.
In his closing arguments for the prosecution case, Crown Advocate Matthew Maletroit said the incident was something that “simply should not have occurred”, outlining a series of failings which he said had led to the collision.
Once they became aware of L’Ecume’s presence, Advocate Maletroit said that monitoring the fishing trawler “should not have been an especially challenging task for trained seamen” but that the communication between the two defendants had been “ineffective, almost non-existent”.
Advocate Maletroit said both crewmen had concerned themselves with a series of non-urgent tasks when they should have been fully-focused on the possibility of a collision, contravening strict protocols that were in place.
“Numerous rules fell by the wayside and safety was not treated as a paramount consideration,” he said, describing that the initial avoiding action taken by Mr Carr, a seven-degree change of course at 5.24am – 11 minutes before the collision – as “woefully inadequate”.
Advocate Maletroit said that both men’s actions showed an indifference to the safety of those on both the Goodwill and L’Ecume, and in reference to the subsequent action prior to the crash, he said: “This was too little, too late – it wasn’t a measured response with effective communication, but a last-minute, panicked reaction.”
The court was told by the prosecuting counsel that Mr Carr had broken a key rule within minutes of taking command of the Goodwill shortly before 5am, allowing Mr Sevash-Zade to go for a meal break when Maritime and Coastguard Agency protocol stated that it was considered “irresponsible and dangerous” to have only a lone lookout on the bridge during the hours of darkness.
Closing arguments are expected to continue on Monday, the 16th day of the trial, with lawyers for the two defendants making their submissions before the presiding judge, Commissioner Sir John Saunders, gives a closing address before members of the jury are sent out to consider their verdicts.
