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Jamaican police investigating the murder of Pakistan cricket coach Bob Woolmer have defended allowing his former teammates to leave the Caribbean country, saying they feared whipping up a diplomatic storm.
Deputy police commissioner Mark Shields said yesterday there were many potential suspects, but gathering information about how 58-year-old Mr Woolmer was strangled in his hotel room the night after Pakistan's shock World Cup loss to Ireland would take time.
Although Britain's Times newspaper said detectives were looking for three fans who it claimed were close to the Pakistani cricket team and who left Jamaica soon after the murder 10 days ago, Mr Shields dismissed speculation that his detectives had specific suspects in mind as "totally wrong".
He said the police were nowhere near naming suspects and warned that the murder inquiry he is heading could take a long time.
Mr Shields defended a decision to allow the Pakistani cricketers to leave Jamaica, saying detaining the whole team would have caused a diplomatic storm.
"It probably would have caused a significant diplomatic incident and had an extremely adverse effect on the World Cup," he said on British television. Stopping the team from leaving Jamaica last weekend would have been "to use a sledgehammer to crack a nut", even though the cricketers shared the 12th floor of the Pegasus Hotel where Mr Woolmer was killed.
Mr Shields said CCTV footage of the hotel corridor outside the room where the coach was found unconscious and surrounded by blood, vomit and faeces remained critically important.
Police were also examining the hard drive of Mr Woolmer's computer for any clues to a motive, and were investigating whether anyone could have used his card key to gain unchallenged access to his room.
Speculation in the cricket world about potential suspects has ranged from crazed fans to a gambling mafia and disgruntled Pakistani team members, who surrendered to police fingerprinting and DNA sampling before leaving Jamaica.
That has prompted an appeal from Pakistan's Foreign Ministry for an end to "malicious" rumours.
"Our players are already traumatised and they have lost somebody who was very close to them," said a spokeswoman.
Mr Shields said police had so far found no reference to match-fixing on Mr Woolmer's computer.
