TWENTY-FOUR-YEAR-OLD Lawrence Lewis was, on Friday, sentenced to two years’ imprisonment after he pleaded guilty to having a spent shell in his possession on September 14 last.

Magistrate Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus, presiding in the New Amsterdam Court, further imposed on the convict the $50,000 fine stipulated by law.
Police Sergeant Phillip Sherrif, prosecuting, revealed that ranks went to the defendant’s home in relation to a matter of assault, and after the allegation was put to him, he indicated that he needed to change his clothes, and was escorted into his bedroom, where one 7.62x51mm round of ammunition was found.
In response to questions by the Magistrate, Lewis said, “Maam, it was a shell which was fired already. I found it in the sand. I did not know it was a bullet, as it had stone at the top.”
Attorney-at-law Charrandas Persaud, standing as a friend of the court, pleaded for leniency for the expectant father and hire car driver.
Persaud said he himself was just recently given a spent shell by a seven-year-old girl, and he noted the haphazard way in which spent shells are disposed by licensed firearm owners.
He argued that the defendant genuinely erred, and pleaded for a suspended sentence.
But the magistrate said she was a creature of the law, and as such had to impose the relevant penalties.