Witness says he failed to identify suspect

A MAN admitted yesterday that he had not been able to identify positively the gunman he saw in a public toilet the night a waiter was shot dead.

William Grant, 51, who was giving evidence for the second day at the trial of 29-year-old Michael Ross, had initially claimed he recognised the accused minutes after seeing him in the Kiln Corner toilets.

But yesterday at the High Court in Glasgow he admitted to Donald Findlay, QC, that the name Michael Ross had been suggested to him as the gunman during a conversation. Ross, a soldier in the Black Watch, is accused of murdering waiter Shamsuddin Mahmood, 26, at the Mumutaz Indian Tandoori restaurant in Bridge Street, Kirkwall, on 2 June, 1994.

Ross, who was only 15 at the time of the alleged murder, is also accused of attempting to defeat the ends of justice.

He denies all charges and has lodged a special defence of alibi, claiming he was nowhere near the Indian restaurant or Kirkwall town centre at the time.

The trial continues.