A Queen?s Counsel called a case against two men charged with five counts of conspiracy to murder a complete joke in Supreme Court yesterday.

But a prosecutor maintained that a ?hit list? sent to Jamaica was meant to end in murder.

?It is like an awful film. What would it be called? High Noon in Bermuda?? John Perry QC asked in his closing argument. ?If I paid to see it and I watched it, I would come out and say I had been robbed! I would say who dreamed up this idiotic story? A conviction would be an indication your fellow citizens are idiots!?

Kenneth Sinclair Durrant, 53 of Ord Road, Warwick and Javon Ernest Gardner, 27, of Crossfield Lane, Sandys have pleaded not guilty to conspiring with Vernon Berkley to kill Det. Sgt. Arthur Glasford, Det. Con. Terry Trott, Det. Con. Llewellyn Edwards, Sharrieff Wales and Dion Ford in Bermuda and elsewhere, on or before November 29, 2004.

In addition, the pair have denied attempting to pervert the course of justice on or before November 29.

If found guilty of conspiracy to murder the maximum sentence would be life.

But Mr. Perry said the prosecution had failed to prove Durrant, Gardner and Berkley had agreed to commit any crime ? let alone murder.

?After this case I will go back to London but you must ask yourself if you want to do this to your citizens,? he said. ?Where was he going to stay, Hamilton Princess at $400 a night? In three nights his money would be gone! Was he going to spray all five at the same time? If he killed a Police officer the whole Bermuda Police Service would be down on whoever that is.?

Defence lawyer Victoria Pearman asked why her client Gardner would send Vernon Berkley clothing on the same day as an alleged hit list.

?Was the clothing to avoid detection?? Ms Pearman asked. ?Was it to make you invisible like the prosecution?s evidence??

And she asked whether Durrant sounded like a murder conspirator when he told Police he did not feel pleasant about what he was going through, he had not done anything wrong and just wanted to clear the matter up.

?Based on the fact everything in Bermuda is so tranquil, any talk about killing anybody and people get so heated they turn into a lynch mob and say to heck with the evidence,? she said. ?There is nothing to say Mr. Berkley is a notorious assassin.

Berkley came to Bermuda in October, 2004 as a victim in a case where he was punched in the mouth.

?Mr. big and bad assassin couldn?t even protect his own teeth!? she said.

However, Senior Crown counsel Carrington Mahoney maintained the letter contained ?lyrics of murder, not an update to a case?.

?If in lyrics the f-word is used like a comma, then why is it missing from his note?? Mr. Mahoney asked. ?The document speaks for itself. Using the defendant?s own words, if someone is very bitter and angry and tells you he is going to f*** you, do you think it will be something good they will come and do to you??

Mr. Mahoney said all of the people allegedly marked for death were witnesses in Gardner?s stun gun assault trial due to start on December 16, 2004.

?Notice the venom, bitterness and hatred from Gardner, even when he gave evidence, against the people he said to kill,? he said. ?These particular persons p***** him off and still p*** him off. Even to this day he has something against all these persons.?

Gardner wanted Det. Sgt. Glasford and the Police who interviewed him to die because they tried to trick him, he said.

The prosecutor also said Gardner did not use slang in normal speech.

He said Durrant must have known the letter contained death threats because he knew Gardner got the names on the list from a lawyer.

And it was too much of a coincidence, he said, that the first time Durrant sent money to Vernon Berkley in Jamaica it contained a ?hit list? of witnesses who Gardner was still angry at.

The trial continues today before Puisne Judge Carlisle Greaves, who is expected to give his summing up before sending the jury out to deliberate.