Wharton found ‘not guilty’, freed
–Cush to return for ‘discretionary sentencing’

By George Barclay
THE two accused in the Mocha schoolgirl murder trial — Jevon Wharton, 25, and Charles Collin Cush, 23 — knew their fate yesterday.Justice Jo-Ann Barlow summed up the evidence at the Demerara Assizes for the alleged murder of nine-year-old Sade Stoby who, according to the prosecution, was raped and murdered in what

was described as a felony murder. The judge then handed over the case to the jury, which later retired to consider its verdict of guilty or not guilty.

The jury took three hours to deliberate and reach its verdict of not guilty and guilty. Wharton, the number one accused, was found ‘not guilty’ of the offence and was freed, while Cush was found ‘guilty’. But according to the law, because he was only 14 when the crime was committed, he could not be sentenced to death. He could, however, be sentenced at the discretion of the judge; and that sentence will have to be made with certain conditions.

As a consequence, the accused Cush was taken away by the police without being sentenced, on condition that he be returned to court on May 24, when a probation report would be made available. It was also decreed that the jury which convicted him should be present in court on the said day at 13:00hrs, when the judge will hear the probation report on Cush, before deciding on a discretionary sentence.

Some who listened to the case and had a little learning of the law were convinced that the accused could not be sentenced for rape, since they were being tried on a case of murder.

And a very poor case of rape-felony it would have been, they said, since the number one accused had seen Sade falling and hitting her head following a sex act. That accused, who has been freed, had said in a statement to the police that he had returned the following day and found the girl dead.

According to him, it was not until the afternoon of the second day that he had found the girl in a swollen condition in a muddy dam with little water not far from an aqueduct. She was dead and partly naked, with her feet spread apart, he’d said.

The accused, through their lawyers Messrs Maxwell McKay and Madan Kissoon, had firstly made no-case submissions in the absence of the jury. The submissions were overruled by the judge, who found that the prosecution had made out a prima facie case that called on the accused to answer to the jury.

The prosecution, conducted by State lawyers Shonette Austin and Siand Dhurjon, built its case on witnesses who testified to the effect that nine-year-old Sade was on her way to school at the Mocha Primary, walking along a dam in October when she was kidnapped, raped, and allegedly murdered in order to escape the crime.

One of the witnesses, Dr. Mohan Persaud, told the jury that the number one accused had abrasions and lacerations on his penis, while the number two accused had abrasions on his penis and back.

At the time the alleged murderers were picked up by the police as suspects, Wharton was 16 and Cush 14. Following investigatons, during which the accused are alleged to have made caution statements admitting the crime, both young men were indicted with murder.