The Guyana Court of Appeal has commenced hearing arguments on its disputed jurisdiction over the appeal filed by former Guyana Defence Force (GDF) coastguards Sherwyn Hart, Deon Greenidge and Devon Gordon who are challenging the death penalty imposed against them for the 2009 murder of Bartica gold dealer Dweive Kant Ramdass.
During arguments yesterday afternoon, Senior Counsel Douglas Mendes who represents the appellants along with attorneys Nigel Hughes, Latchmie Rahamat and a battery of other lawyers, argued that the court does have jurisdiction to hear the case.
Contrary to what Direc-tor of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Shalimar Ali-Hack is likely to advance when arguments continue this afternoon, Mendes said that the appellate court’s jurisdiction to hear the appeal stands in accordance with Section 12 of the Court of Appeal Act.
That section he says, gives the appellants an automatic right of appeal to the superior court.
In challenging the imposition of the death penalty on the convicts, Mendes argues that it violates the constitutional right to protection from cruel, inhumane and degrading punishment as provided for in Article 141.
He argues, too, that that particular penalty is arbitrary, when one considers the fact that there is no means of redress after its imposition; where it may be found that a human or other error may have resulted in a totally wrongful conviction.
A person sentenced to life he argued, has the opportunity of being freed in such circumstances, but for a person executed, there is just no such hope.
Expounding on the merits of the appeal, the senior counsel said that a sentence of death violates four core constitutional principles—the Rule of Law, the right to protection of the law, equality before the law and the right to respect for human dignity.
He said that Articles 40, 141, 144 and 149 all speak to the entrenched nature of these rights, which the inherent nature of the death penalty violates.
The arguments will continue this afternoon at 1:30 before acting Chancellor Yonette Cummings-Edwards and Justices of Appeal Dawn Gregory and Rishi Persaud.
Following a High Court trial back in 2013 a jury had found Hart, Greenidge and Gordon guilty of murdering Ramdass. Justice Franklyn Holder would subsequently sentence them to death.
The prosecution’s case has been that the three threw Ramdass overboard between August 20 and August 22, 2009, at Caiman Hole, East Bank Essequibo, after robbing him of $17 million he had been paid for a quantity of gold he sold to two men.
