The October sessions of the Berbice Assizes closed with five cases being completed, resulting in two death sentences, while one  accused was   spared the hangman’s noose due to his age;  another  pleaded  guilty to manslaughter, and two  who were facing  a joint  indictment for murder  were acquitted . Justice Roxanne George and Justice Brassington Reynolds presided over the sessions, while the State Prosecutor was Ms. Primitha  Kissoon.
At the commencement of the hearings in October, Herman Ali known as ‘Shark Oil’ who faced a retrial was sentenced to death after spending five years as a remanded prisoner.
The prosecution’s case though circumstantial, included a dying declaration, in which Roydel Sandy told Danny Goberdan that   ‘Shark Oil bore me’,  and  a caution statement in which Ali confessed to killing his fellow villager, after he had intervened in a matter .
Ali had told investigators that while he was in front of his yard, Marva , a neighbour,  started to verbally abuse him  and then  chucked him, prior to questioning him about a matter at the lower court , in which the magistrate had given him time  to pay a fine for an offence.
“After she chucked me, I chucked her back. Her daughter came with a knife and Roydel intervened and I bore his belly.”                                       
However, Rayan Ali was spared the death sentence  although the mixed jury had returned  a  unanimous verdict of guilty for the unlawful killing of his uncle Premchand Sugrim called  ‘Copper’.
 His attorney Kumar Doraisami had advanced the teen’s birth certificate which confirmed that he was aged 15 years 9 months at the time the offence was committed on July 10, 2011.  Ali was born on October 14, 1995.  
Consequently, his imprisonment was at the court’s pleasure , which is to be reviewed  every two years on the anniversary of this initial  sentence .
  Ali is to return to the Berbice Assizes on November 15, 2014 for consideration, in order  to make a determination whether he should be released or not .  “We need to keep track. I don’t want him to fall through the cracks,” stipulated Justice Roxanne George.
Eyewitness  and  then 11–year-old Gomattie Singh , recalled   that she was hanging laundered clothes on a line, when she observed  Premchand Sugrim  called  ‘ Copper’,  uncle of the accused,  walking along a dam at Number 53 Village backlands.
Having been earlier ruled as being  competent to give sworn evidence, the Grade Seven student  told the mixed assizes jury that she saw  Rayan Ali , known as Karran, run out from nearby black sage  bushes, and  “before I could holler  Copper ‘ watch out , Karran knock ‘Copper on his head with an iron pipe  three feet in length , which he threw aside before fleeing the scene.”
“I called Shabanna [ Bibi Baskh ] who lived two houses away , and told her how Karran knocked  Copper  on the dam. I cried .  Shabanna went to the scene , and placed  Copper  head on her foot . She wrapped  Copper’s  head with his shirt. His right side head was bleeding. ‘Copper’s son Karran called the police, and they then go away with Copper.”
Another eyewitness Ram Singh, had recounted that   shortly before 10:00hrs, he was walking with the now deceased, who was armed with a cutlass.
Singh noted that   Copper never used the weapon, as the cutlass had pitched from his hand onto the dam when Karran struck ‘Copper’ on his head with an iron pipe.    
 However, in his unsworn statement from the dock, Ali ,who attempted to lead self-defence,  told the court that  after he had awakened  at his uncle’s  house, he left and went to Aunt Kamani’s home where he had breakfast..
Moments later he was standing on the Middle Walk dam , where he saw Uncle  Copper  with a cutlass , “which he used to broadside me on my buttocks , whilst telling me to return to my mother’s house at Black Bush Polder.
“I walked away, but he followed behind me cursing .  I saw an iron pipe on the dam. I picked up the pipe and my Aunt Kamani  hollered out.  I dropped the pipe.  Uncle Copper walked away and shortly afterwards he returned. I was sitting on the culvert and he fired a chop with the cutlass. I picked up the iron bar , and gave him a lash  to his head. He fell to the ground and I dropped the iron pipe.  If I had  not lashed him, he would have killed me.”
However , another teenager Nazrudeen Jhoot was not so fortunate, as he had the death warrant read to him  by Justice Brassington Reynolds  moments after the mixed jury remained  undivided in their decision to find him guilty.
The prosecution’s case which was based on the caution statement attributed to Jhoot, and which the judge ruled was given freely and voluntarily, records Jhoot as saying he was a salesboy from Lethem,  and that he along with Lisa Mangal loved one another . Lisa  had lived with her parents [Ivorine Dukia and Kemlall Mangal ]  who had disapproved of the relationship,  and he told  Lisa to go away with him  but she refused .  
“On August 25, 2008, Lisa and her mother went to Georgetown and   I was drinking in the street . When I was going home, [ Kemlall Mangal ]  ‘Ochro’   meet me and tell me that we come here to take him out of  business.  I went home and collect my knife.  ‘Ochro’ was drinking . He then came out of the yard   with a wood to lash me . We scramble each other  and fell into a nearby trench .  I juk [bore] ‘Ochro’ many times . I see blood . I come out the trench and go home and catch a bus to Georgetown , then to Lethem .The police did not catch me when I juk [bore] ‘Ochro’.”
However, Defence Counsel Charrandas Persaud   had urged the jury not to accept the signature on the statement as being that of his client, as there were some discrepancies  and it seemed as though ‘time had stood still’.
But rebutting, State Counsel Kissoon emphasised  that once the jury accepted  the statement as being one given by the accused,  then they must convict .
Another convict, Anderson Nicholson, who had murdered his wife, whom he had married three months earlier, escaped the gallows after he confessed to a manslaughter indictment. He was sentenced to 13 years imprisonment.
Defence  Counsel  Tania Clements- Warren , in a  mitigation plea  said  while the act was never intended ,  her client  noted that  it was his mother -in- law who was being  overly  influential in his relationship , which caused tension between himself and late wife .
In a summarizing  the facts,  Kissoon    said   prosecution  eyewitness ,  Romain Alexander, the mother-in- law  of the accused , was at home at Rosignol Village   when she received information resulting in her going to a nearby dam, where she saw her daughter and the convict having an argument .
She intervened by parting the couple and taking her daughter home .  But  while  her daughter was on the stairway of her  residence ,  Nicholson entered the yard and verbally abused his wife.
“He went into the house, picked up a cutlass, then into the backyard, where he fired chops at Trevlin.’’
The witness in an attempt to save her daughter said she went between the accused and her daughter, and   as a result she received  a chop to her forehead , forcing her to exit the yard while her daughter ran to what is known as the PNC dam.
Alexander said Nicholson continued chopping his wife,  as wounds were seen at the back of the victim’s  leg and her neck , prior to her collapsing on the pathway.
The victim’s son, now 10-years-old, who had witnessed his mother’s death , told the Guyana Chronicle that he had  recalled the incident in which he saw his foster father  run after  his mother with a fork , prior to  being armed with a cutlass  which he used to inflict the fatal injuries .
“What he did was wrong. I am sorry that I had to lose my mother  in such a horrific way,”  he lamented as he stood in the corridor of the Berbice Assizes with his grandmother.
Justice George perusing the evidence noted that there was proof of domestic violence. Additionally, it was noted that the probation reports spoke of incidents of infidelity, especially in relation to the   previous relationship of the accused.
‘’He should have ended the relationship as he did the previous one. There are always choices.  He has similar transgression. Shortly after the marriage the incident occurred.  ’Till death do us part.’ I am glad the accused found religious satisfaction. He became the judge, jury and executioner.   Regarding his previous relationships, he was not without sin. However, this act cannot be condoned.”
Meanwhile , Mark Esteem Massiah walked through the doors of the Berbice Assizes a free man after presiding Judge Roxanne George   upheld a no-case submission and ordered  the mixed jury to return  a formal verdict of not guilty in his favour .
 Massiah , called ‘Red Man’,  was indicted for the murder of the dreadlocked  Ian Adonis  called  ‘Saffo’, who sustained injuries to his head, which resulted in his death on August 29, 2007 at Hosanna Street , Rosignol ,West Bank Berbice.
Reflecting on the evidence, the judge noted that  Massiah acted in self-defence ,  as ’The deceased kept attacking him with a knife . Massiah  was seated outside a snackette at the Rosignol Stelling road when ‘Saffo’ demanded money from him, while placing a knife to his chest.
“After several threats, a report was made to a police officer standing nearby, but  ‘Saffo ‘ cursed the officer and continued to pursue Massiah .  Another man called ‘Antics ‘ approached ‘Saffo’ , but the latter on seeing  ‘Red man ‘ turned again on him  with a black-handled knife in his hand .”
According to the caution statement attributed to Massaih , after  he was attacked, he picked up a piece of wood  and lashed him on his head . “Adonis had a knife in his hand, I left him and went away.”
Co-accused Sean Benjamin called ‘Black Boy’  was thereafter acquitted by the jury , after Defence Counsel Raymond Ali  noted that the prosecution’s  case turned  on the evidence of Leslyn Nightingale, known as ‘Black Bird’ , who  was the prosecution’s eyewitness to the crime, allegedly committed  by his client .
Ali opined that the allegation against his client was  a result of Nightingale being referred to as ‘Black Bird’ by ‘Black Boy’. The then 18-year-old was definitely not pleased at being referred to as a ‘black bird’, he emphasised.
“ She [ the eyewitness ] is a prolific liar . Was she really there?  This is the era of the mobile phone, yet she told no one.   This witness waited until a second blow was given an hour later , then she went home and fell asleep. She never told anyone. According to her the first lash was given at 23:15hrs and the second  an hour later.”
In an unsworn statement from the dock, Benjamin , narrating the events of the night,said he had gone to make a purchase at a snackette along the Rosignol Stelling road where one Jennifer Moriah was employed .
On seeing food items in the glass case he expressed the need to have  something to eat , but  the seller  responded by yelling in his face .
An argument ensued and Moriah stopped a nearby policeman and informed the cop that he  had assaulted her .  “We were both arrested.”
Recalling the evidence of the eyewitness, Benjamin said  he  and  Nightingale  would always have an argument.
“She always promised to give me trouble,” he is recorded as saying.