A 20-year-old, who beat a man to death with a hammer while he was a teenager, was on Thursday sentenced to seven years in prison on a manslaughter charge.
The youth was earlier this year indicted for the capital offence of murder to which he pleaded not guilty. He, however, copped to the lesser charge of manslaughter and admitted that on July 17th, 2016 at Unity Street, La Grange West Bank Demerara, he unlawfully killed James Stewart.
The prosecution’s case was that on the day in question, the then juvenile armed himself with a hammer before setting out to find Stewart.
He then dealt the man a lash to his head after which he returned to a relative’s house and admitted that he had killed someone.
The court had heard that the youth’s clothing was bloody, even as he held up the blood-stained hammer. He is said to have slept and gotten up there the very morning and washed his clothes.
Later that morning the police found Stewart’s lifeless body lying on the streets in a pool of blood with injuries to his head and face.
Pathologist Dr Nehaul Singh had given the cause of death as cerebral haemorrhage as a result of multiple blunt trauma to the head, compounded by bronchial aspiration of blood.
In imposing the sentence, Justice Sandil Kissoon started at a base of 25 years from which a third of the total was deducted for the early guilty plea, which saved the court considerable time in otherwise having to conduct a trial.
Two years were, however added for aggravating factors presented by the prosecution, but then eight years were subtracted for the plea in mitigation advanced by the offender’s attorney. An additional deduction of four years was made for time served awaiting trial.
Thus, the sentence imposed was seven years.
The youth was represented by attorney Maxwell McKay, while the state’s case was presented by prosecutors Nafeeza Baig and Tuanna Hardy.
