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KINGSTON, Jamaica - The international governing body of cricket said Friday it would investigate whether match-fixing was a motive for the slaying of Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer, who was strangled after his team was upset by Ireland.
Deputy Police Commissioner Mark Shields said police believed more than one person may have killed Woolmer, 58, in his 12th-floor hotel room Sunday. His team’s humiliating defeat Saturday assured Pakistan’s elimination from the Cricket World Cup.
After days of speculation that Woolmer may have died of natural causes or even committed suicide, Police Commissioner Lucius Thomas confirmed Thursday evening that the pathologist had declared the cause of death as “asphyxia as a result of manual strangulation.”
Police said they were reviewing security cameras in and around the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel and asked witnesses to come forward if they had seen anything suspicious in the upscale hotel, where Woolmer and the rest of the Pakistan squad had been staying.
“With that many people in the hotel it’s no doubt that somebody saw something,” Shields said.
John Issa, the hotel’s chairman of the board of directors, told local radio that there are no records of anyone else entering Woolmer’s room with a card key. “The records show that no one entered because the keys are electronic and we would have seen this,” he said.
On Friday, authorities obtained DNA samples from Pakistan team members to help eliminate potential suspects, Shields said. Late Thursday, the team traveled to Montego Bay, on the western side of the island, after being interviewed and fingerprinted by police.
Shields said the team would be allowed to leave the country as scheduled Saturday.
Patrick Murphy, a coroner in Jamaica, said Woolmer’s body must remain on the Caribbean island until an inquest is held. A date for that has not been set.
Separately, the International Cricket Council’s anti-corruption unit will investigate if match-fixing had a role in Woolmer’s death, council chief executive Malcolm Speed said.
“Our people from the anti-corruption and security unit will cooperate with the Jamaica police, they’re working with them already,” Speed told Britain’s Sky TV. “If there is a link we want to know about it and we will deal with it.”
Woolmer was South Africa’s coach in the 1990s when the team’s captain, Hansie Cronje, admitted taking money to fix matches and was banned from cricket for life. Woolmer was never implicated.
His family said it was unaware of any death threats against him or any involvement in match-fixing.
“To the best of the family’s knowledge, there is absolutely nothing to suggest Bob was involved in match-fixing,” his agent, Michael Cohen, said Friday, reading a statement outside the Woolmer family home near Cape Town, South Africa. He was flanked by Woolmer’s widow, Gill, and their sons, Dale and Russell.
The coach was last seen going to his room Saturday night after the Pakistan team, normally a world powerhouse, was upset by underdog Ireland in the first round of the World Cup.
He was found by a maid the next day, laying half out of his bathroom and dressed in boxer shorts. One witness reporting seeing blood and vomit splattered in the room, but another said he saw vomit only in the toilet. Police have not released details about the crime scene.
“Because Bob was a large man, it would have taken some significant force to subdue him, but of course at this stage we do not know how many people were in the room,” Shields told reporters. “It could be one or more people involved in this murder.”
Whoever killed the affable coach gained access to his room without forcing the door open and attacked Woolmer without people in neighboring rooms noticing anything amiss. Access to guest floors is restricted at the hotel — a card key is required to operate the elevators.
Nasim Ashraf, who resigned as chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board after the defeat to Ireland, told The Press Trust of India news agency that Woolmer was ready to announce his retirement and had said people made “personal attacks” on him after the squad’s poor showing.
Former Pakistan fast bowler Sarfraz Nawaz has claimed that Woolmer, a former player for England, was killed because he was writing a book that would expose illegal gambling in cricket.
But Woolmer’s family denied that.
“Contrary to reports, we can confirm there is nothing in any book Bob has written that would explain this situation and there were no threats received,” the family statement said.
Pakistan team spokesman Pervez Jamil Mir said Woolmer was upset that galleys of his book had disappeared.
“Bob told me the proofs had been misplaced and he was very disturbed.” Mir said. “I don’t know what was in the book but that was his only copy at the time.”
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