22 condemned prisoners housed at Mazaruni
Death row escapee Mark Royden Williams
Death row escapee Mark Royden Williams

 

TWENTY-two of 25 persons sentenced to death are at the Mazaruni Prison and two others are at another prison location, prison officials confirmed.

The 25th is escapee Mark Royden Williams called “Smallie”, who was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until death on February 2, 2017, following a lengthy jury trial for the Bartica Massacre.

Royden Williams was also sentenced with Dennis Williams, called “Anaconda”. They were each sentenced to death by hanging after a jury found them guilty of seven counts of murder.

They were also found guilty on five counts of manslaughter, in addition to receiving life imprisonment sentences.

The two men were part of the most notorious gang in Guyana’s history, led by Rondell Rawlins called “Fine Man”, which invaded the mining community of Bartica on February 17, 2008.

During the invasion, they murdered Lance Corporal Zaheer Zakir and Constables Shane Fredericks and Ron Osborne as well as Edwin Gilkes, Dexter Adrian, Irving Ferreira, Deonarine Singh, Ronald Gomes, Ashraf Khan, Abdool Yasseen, Errol Thomas and Baldeo Singh.

Although the Guyana Prison Service (GPS) was ready to execute the death penalty, a moratorium has been in place since 1997 and President David Granger himself has made it clear that he has no intention of taking anyone’s life.

Prison officials have revealed that two of the death row inmates are reportedly ill as the Guyana Prison Service seeks to rebuild the Camp Street Prison.

According to a senior prison officer, the hanging of those persons sentenced to death who would have exhausted their rights to appeal, will be carried out if the President signs the order of execution.

“So those persons who are sentenced to death, provided that they would have exhausted their rights to appeal and their death sentence is confirmed, the President at any one time can sign the order of execution and it will have to be carried out,” the officer noted.

However, if such orders are not given, prisoners on death row will remain there for the rest of their lives and will be treated in keeping with the laws and guidance outlined for ‘death sentence’ prisoners.

Human rights activists continue to be angered by judges here who hand down death sentences and have railed against successive governments for still having capital punishment in the law books.

Guyana is also party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Article Six protects the right to life. It does not make the death penalty illegal, but it imposes a treaty obligation on states to proceed to complete abolition of the death penalty.

President Granger made it clear last year that he does not intend to sign the order of execution of any prisoner, even though no concrete decision has yet been made as to whether his government intends to abolish the death penalty.

Some death row inmates seeking release would have been in prison for more than 20 years.

Among them are Muntaz Ali, Terrence Sahadeo, Hafiz Hussein, Bharatraj Mulai and his brother Lallman, Ganga Deolall (Crankshaft), Oral Hendricks, Bryan Vandeyar, Lawrence Chand, Colwyn Smart, Vivekanand Singh, Kornel and Daniel Vaux, Derrick Calendar and Compton Tryell.

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