Justice Brassington Reynolds yesterday imposed a twelve-year sentence on Shawn Tyndall who confessed to the unlawful killing of his lover Camille Medina De Jonge at her Manchester Village home between September 24 and 25, 2006.
Tyndall was initially indicted at the Berbice Assizes for murder but following an unsuccessful bid by defence attorney Raymond Ali to have the confession statement thrown out, the accused threw in the towel by pleading guilty to the lesser count of manslaughter, which was accepted by the State.
State Prosecutor Rhondel Weaver urged the court to take into consideration that a life had been taken through violence.
Dispelling defence arguments that the now deceased woman was the aggressor and a bully, the prosecutor said “Camille De Jonge is not on trial, she is the victim. Her two school-aged children now aged 16 years and 10 years went to bed on the night of the incident with a mother, and awoke without one.”
Earlier in a summary of the State’s case, Weaver said De Jonge lived at Manchester Village, Corentyne with her two children, then aged 10 and 7 years respectively, while Shawn Tyndall was in a legal union with Jonette Tyndall.
On September 24, 2006, the now deceased woman took the two children to a horse racing meet and thereafter went to buy ice cream before going home.
Later that evening when the children were asleep Tyndall visited and following an argument he fatally wounded her.
On awakening the following morning the children saw their mother lying in a pool of blood and after failing to awaken her, they alerted a neighbour who subsequently summoned the police.
A post-mortem report prepared by Dr. Vivikanand Brijmohan revealed that death was due to the severed carotid artery, a stab wound and shock and haemorrhage and the partial fracturing of the fourth vertebrae.
