Man convicted for rape and sexual activity with six-year-old appeals sentence
Selwyn Lancaster
Selwyn Lancaster

WEEKS after 45-year-old Selwyn Lancaster was sentenced to 15 years in prison, for raping a six-year-old girl in 2018, and also engaging in sexual activity with her, he has filed an appeal to challenge his conviction and sentence.

On October 29, 2019, Lancaster was sentenced by Justice Simone Morris-Ramlall, at the Sexual Offenders Court at the High Court, for rape of a child under the age of 16 and sexual activity.

The first charge stated that, on October 6, 2018, in Linden, he engaged in sexual penetration with a child under the age of 16.

The second charge alleged that, on November 6, 2018, Lancaster engaged in sexual activity with the child, by touching her vagina.

He was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment on the first charge and 7 years’ imprisonment for the second charge. Justice Morris-Ramlall had ordered that the sentences run concurrently.

Lancaster’s attorneys, Gordon Gilhuys and Yondessa Welcome-Mercurius, moved to the appeal court and filed an appeal to challenge their client’s conviction and sentence.
One of the grounds of the appeal was that Justice Morris-Ramlall made an error in summing up the evidence to the jury.

Another ground stated that the trial judge misdirected the jury when she proposed to them that she would not read all the evidence while summing up.
Further, Lancaster’s attorneys are arguing that the Judge’s ‘summing up’ was not balanced and favoured to the prosecution.

The court of appeal is yet to set a date in this matter.

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