have retired to consider their verdict.

Teiko Furbert and Sheldon Franks were sentenced to life imprisonment in April for the murder of James Cyrus Caines, who died after being shot in the face.

During the original trial both defendants claimed the other fired the fatal shot.

On Tuesday barristers representing the two men criticised the trial judge, claiming that he had misdirected the jury and allowed contentious evidence to be made admissible.

But yesterday Mr. Elliot Mottley, representing The Crown, defended Puisne Judge Richard Ground.

He countered arguments put by the defence that the judge failed to distinguish between an unlawful act and an unlawful purpose.

And he also said that notes made by a detective who spoke to Furbert just before he was charged -- which the defence argued should have been made inadmissible -- was never used as part of the prosecution case anyway.

Mr. Mottley said that the defence had questioned whether or not the notes had been made at the time of the talk and the fact that they were very neatly written strengthened their argument that they had been prepared later.

And responding to accusations that the judge should not have allowed Mr.

Caines' dying words to be heard as evidence Mr. Mottley said: "The evidence is that Caines and Franks were in close proximity to each other and, on his own statement, Franks said something to the deceased.

"It was in those circumstances, shortly after, that Caines made his dying declaration and the judge exercised his discretion and allowed it into evidence.'' Earlier Mr. Mark Pettingill, representing Franks, claimed that an article in The Royal Gazette published on the final day of the trial in which Public Safety Minister Quinton Edness urged jurors to convict drug smugglers, could have prejudiced the jury.

But Mr. Mottley countered that one article alone would not be sufficient to affect the jury.

"In this case he didn't make any mention of murder, he was talking about drugs,'' Mr. Mottley said.

The Appeal Court reserved judgment in the case until a later date.