L'Ecume II case 'huge in scale' says Jersey police

Senior investigating officer Andy Shearwood said the investigation was challenging

The States of Jersey Police's investigation into the deaths of three fishermen after a ferry collided with a trawler was "huge in scale", according to the senior investigating officer.

Andy Shearwood said the initial recovery of the fishing boat wreck was the most challenging part of the case because of weather and sea conditions during the winter.

All three crew on L'Ecume II died after the vessel collided with a Condor freight ferry in December 2022.

On Friday, a jury acquitted one ferry worker of manslaughter and was unable to reach a verdict for his crew mate on the same charge over the deaths.

'Really emotive'

Speaking ahead of the verdict, Shearwood said his team had followed "all lines of inquiry" to do the "best job possible for the court and the families of those who died".

He described the days after the collision as the most challenging he experienced while working on the case.

The fishing trawler had set off from St Helier, Jersey, on the morning of 8 December 2022 with three crew on board.

Michael Michieli, Larry Simyunn and Jervis Baligat were all killed when it collided with the Commodore Goodwill later that morning.

"[It] happened just before Christmas. It was the middle of winter and conditions were not ideal for recovery" he said.

"It took a long time for us to be in a position to safely access the wreck after the initial search and recovery phase."

He also reflected on the wait to recover and return the missing sailors to their families, calling them "really difficult days".

He said: "Until you get to that final moment where you can phone the family and say we have recovered him… and give them the opportunity of being at the harbour when Michael was brought ashore, that was really emotive."

'No easy feat'

Shearwood said 290 witness statements were taken from 169 different people as part of the investigation.

"That's huge in scale," he said.

From those interviews, 22 people were called to give evidence in court, boiling down the evidence to those that were "really crucial to the details of the case", he said.

CCTV was also a key part of evidence presented in court, recovery of which Mr Shearwood described as "no easy feat".

He added: "It needs a huge number of officers to go out and scope it, find it, recover it and do all of that before it falls off systems with defined amounts of storage."

He also said his team pored over 800 documents and seized more than 1,000 exhibits.

CCTV footage showed L'Ecume II in the hours before the crash

Artur Sevash-Zade and Lewis Carr stood trial at Jersey's Royal Court accused of three charges of gross negligence manslaughter related to the crash.

After four weeks of evidence and deliberation jurors could not reach a verdict on the charges against Carr, 30, but found him guilty of a breach of Jersey's shipping law.

Mr Sevash-Zade, 35, was found not guilty of gross negligence manslaughter and the jury could not reach a verdict on the shipping law charge.

Speaking after the verdicts, Shearwood said the families had suffered "an immeasurable loss" and had shown "extraordinary dignity throughout" the process.

He went on to say: "While the verdicts cannot undo the devastating events of that morning, we hope the conclusion of proceedings provide some measure of closure for the families and for our wider communities."

Shearwood is a retired Thames Valley Police Detective Chief Inspector who was brought in to lead the investigation.