…asks judge for mercy, leniency

ON Friday afternoon in a packed courtroom in the Georgetown High Court before Justice Navindra Singh, a composed Hofosawa Awena Rutherford, asked the court for mercy and leniency when she was asked what she had to say before sentencing.

The well-dressed woman however, asked the judge for a probation report to be prepared before sentencing and the request was granted.

As such, the sentencing was adjourned to April 9, 2018 at 13:00hrs before the same judge.

On Thursday afternoon, a 12-member jury found the 25-year-old woman guilty of two counts of manslaughter, after which she fainted repeatedly.

She was found guilty of the ‘rat poison’ killing of her two young children back in 2014.

She was on trial in the Georgetown High Court before Justice Navindra Singh and a 12-member jury for the March 27, 2014 alleged ‘rat poisoning’ of her two children at her home at Branch Road, Mahaicony, East Coast Demerara.

On Wednesday when the trial continued in the Georgetown High Court, in leading her defence, the accused opted to give an unsworn statement from the prisoner’s box.

Rutherford told the court that she did not poison her children and she was tramautised by the memory of losing them.

She said, “I didn’t buy rat poison to kill my children, it was cold tablets I gave them.”

Rutherford in a very teary address to the court on Wednesday, said she was not treated fairly by the police because they accused her of poisoning her children.

One of those who took the stand on Wednesday included Government Pathologist Dr Nehaul Singh, who gave the cause as pesticide poisoning by carbon tablets (rat poison), also called aluminium sulphate.

She pleaded not guilty to the charge of two counts of manslaughter and is being represented by defence counsel Adrian Thompson.

Meanwhile, the state’s case is led by prosecutor Tiffini Lyken in association with Shawnette Austin and Abigail Gibbs.

In Lyken’s opening statement following the empanelling on Monday, she told the court that one-year-old Jabari Cadogan and four-year-old Odasia Cadogan died from pesticide poisoning.