DEATH row convict Abishai Caesar, who is currently serving three life sentences for the 2012 murder of Anna Catherina liquor store owner, Jennifer Persaud, and her two sons, is now challenging his conviction and sentence.
Last month, Caesar was sentenced by Justice Sandil Kissoon at the Demerara High Court, after he was found guilty by a 12-member jury on three counts of murder.
Caesar was convicted for the murders of 41-year-old Persaud called “Jenny,” and her sons, six-year-old Afridi Bacchus and 18-month-old Jadon Ernest, between September 21 and 22, 2012, at Sea View, Anna Catherina.
The judge had told Caesar that he had no other alternative but to impose a sentence of death since he treated life and death as “meaningless” and showed no remorse for his horrific action.
Caesar, in his documents filed at the Court of Appeal, claims that his conviction cannot stand. He is asking that his sentence be set aside since it was unfair, too severe, and excessive.
One of the main witnesses in the case at the High Court was Zoey Phillips, the former reputed wife of Caesar and neighbour of Persaud.

“Abishai said to me that he was going over to Jenny to get some money because he was broke,” Phillips had told the court during her testimony.
The couple then went into the kitchen in the lower flat of their home, where Caesar armed himself with a knife and a pair of green gloves. He was clad in a pair of 3/4 pants at the time.
The witness said that Caesar went to the back of their house and gained entry into their neighbour’s yard through an opening in the zinc fence. According to Phillips, her neighbour had clear glass windows and so she was able to see Caesar in the woman’s house by peeping through the louvre window in her bedroom.
After seeing Caesar as he went up the stairs to Persaud’s home, Phillips claimed that she went to bed and fell asleep. She was later awakened by the sound of a woman screaming and sat on her bed. Thirty minutes later, Caesar called for her and she went downstairs into the kitchen and opened the back door for him.

According to Phillips, Caesar had a small cardboard beer box in his hands and told her that that was all he had gotten from raiding Persaud’s home. The box contained a number of $20 and $100 bills which amounted to $3,000. He also came back with the pair of gloves and a knife, both of which had what appeared to be blood. There were also what appeared to be spots of blood on his pants. The witness disclosed that her reputed husband told her that Persaud woke up and saw him in her house and he killed her because she saw his face and knew him well.
Caesar, Phillips explained, told her that while he was stabbing Jennifer, the older son woke up and saw him. This caused him to kill the child and later the toddler. The couple then went to the seawall, where Caesar threw the knife into the river. They then went into the street and Caesar threw the gloves and pants into some bushes.
The witness said they returned to their home and went to sleep.
In 2019, Caesar was first tried before Justice Brassington Reynolds, but the case was sent for retrial after a 12-member jury was unable to arrive at a verdict.